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 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD
 
 The French Censor allowed the manu- 
 script of this book to pass, having already 
 permitted the passage of the letters which 
 compose it. But, in accordance with the 
 regulations regarding photographs, the 
 photographic illustrations which were 
 to accompany the manuscript were not 
 allowed to leave France.
 
 THE PEAK 
 OF THE LOAD 
 
 THE WAITING MONTHS ON THE HILLTOP 
 
 FROM THE ENTRANCE OF THE STARS 
 
 AND STRIPES TO THE SECOND 
 
 VICTORY ON THE MARNE 
 
 BY 
 
 MILDRED ALDRICH 
 
 AUTHOR OF " A HILLTOP ON THE MARNE," " ON THE EDGE 
 OF THE WAR ZONE " 
 
 LONDON 
 CONSTABLE & COMPANY Ltd. 
 
 1919
 
 Printed in Great Britain by 
 
 Richard Clay & Sons, Limited, 
 
 brunswick ft., stamford st., s.e. i. 
 
 and bungay, suffolk.
 
 TO THE BOYS OF THE 
 
 * AMEX * 
 
 WHO HAVE GONE OVER THE HILLTOP 
 INTO THE FIGHTING LINE
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 I 
 
 April 20, 191 7 
 Dear Old Girl — 
 
 I have had a rather busy two weeks, during 
 which, for many reasons, I have not felt in the 
 spirit to sit down and write you the long letter I 
 know you expect in response to your great episto- 
 lary cry of triumph after the Declaration of War. 
 
 Personally, after the uplift the decision gave me, 
 came a total collapse and I had some pretty black 
 days. I had to fight against the fear that we were 
 too late, and the conviction that, if we were really 
 to do our part at the front, the war was still to 
 last not one year but years. An army cannot be 
 created in a day, and the best will in the world, 
 and all the pluck I know our lads to have, will 
 not make them, inside of at least a year, into a 
 fighting army fit to stand against the military 
 science of Germany, and do anything more service- 
 able than die like heroes. 
 
 Besides, no matter from what point of view one 
 looks at the case, it does make a difference to think 
 that our boys are coming over here to go into this 
 holocaust. 
 
 You must know that, even among officers in 
 the army, who welcome with enthusiasm the 
 
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 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 entrance of the States into the ranks of the Allies, 
 there are plenty who are still optimistic about 
 the war's duration, and who smile, and say : 
 " Don't fret. Your boys will march in the 
 triumphal procession. The generous aid the 
 States have given us earns them that right, but 
 they cannot get ready to fire their guns in time to 
 do much at the front." 
 
 I hope you will take it in the right spirit when 
 I say I don't want it to end like that, and I am 
 sure it won't. Personally I think the end is a 
 long way off, and 1 can't tell you how our boys 
 are needed. Besides, put it at the fact that Fate 
 is to take a proportionate toll from our army — 
 the other nations will have had nearly four years, 
 if not quite four, before our losses begin. 
 
 Our men are going to leave their women and 
 children in safety, in a land that can never know 
 the horrors of invasion. I don't want to dwell on 
 that idea, but it is a comfort all the same. 
 
 You say in your last that our boys are coming 
 across the ocean " to die in a foreign land." Yes, 
 I know. But they are coming to a country 
 where they are already loved. Wonderful pre- 
 parations are going to be made to care for them, 
 and I do believe the United States, as a govern- 
 ment and as a people, is going to make the great 
 sacrifice — economic, material and spiritual — which 
 the situation demands of her in a manner which 
 will make us all proud of her as a nation and 
 will set a seal of nobility on the future of the 
 race and place our sort of democracy in the front 
 ranks for ever. 
 
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 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 More than that, I believe that the States will 
 come out of it more united than they have ever 
 been, and, I hope, with the many elements, re- 
 sulting from our long wideopened door of immi- 
 gration, welded into a people. 
 
 You and 1, who love our country, in spite of, 
 not because of, her faults, can surely at this stage 
 of the game agree that the lessons we are going 
 to learn are needed, and that out of the sorrow 
 we know is before us may come results that could 
 never have been achieved otherwise. 
 
 I — who have been living so long in the midst 
 of it, and have seen with what undying gaiety 
 youth meets even these conditions — smile even 
 through the certainty of later tears when I think 
 of some aspects of the situation. Just reflect, for 
 example, on the thousands of our boys who never 
 dreamed of (< coming to Europe," who don't even 
 know its geography or its history, who never 
 bothered about architecture or archaeology, who 
 are going to make the voyage across the big pond. 
 They are going to see foreign parts, hear foreign 
 tongues, rub elbows with races they never saw or 
 thought of seeing before. They are going to 
 have hard times, but crowds facing hard times 
 together seem to get some fun out of it. They 
 are going to be hardened into fine physical form 
 by exercise. They are going to learn discipline, 
 which, if the youth of any country ever needed, 
 ours does, and they are going to learn the mean- 
 ing of obedience, which the youth of America, 
 accustomed to domineer over its elders, will be 
 the better for learning. 
 
 3
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 You see I always look for the compensations, 
 and, as I have told you before, if one looks hard 
 enough, they are to be found. 
 
 In my mental vision always hangs the idea, 
 which so many are fearful to face — death is the 
 common fate of us all. 
 
 However, I never sit up straight at a thought 
 so ordinary, with such calm philosophy, that a 
 little imp does not, with a malicious gesture, sweep 
 the mists out of my eyes, and make me realize 
 that, from Macaulay, with his — 
 
 " To every man upon this earth 
 
 Death cometh soon or late. 
 And how can man die better 
 
 Than facing fearful odds 
 For the ashes of his fathers 
 
 And the temples of his gods ? " 
 
 to the priest in his pulpit, the orator in his 
 tribune — and me sitting before my typewriter- 
 words are easy. Yet even when I smile, I know 
 that you and I, and oh ! how many million others, 
 would rather be out there " somewhere in France ' 
 than sitting quietly, inactively, at home, looking 
 at the thick curtain which the necessary censor 
 hangs before us, and waiting in patient suspense. 
 The helpless looker-on in any struggle suffers 
 more than those who are absorbed in its action. 
 Isn't it a mercy that we believe this, whether 
 it be wholly true or not ? Also, though Macaulay 
 sounds grandiloquent, the idea is as true to-day 
 as it was in the days of old Rome of which he 
 wrote, for our boys are coming over not to fight 
 for France, but to fight for Liberty, which is the 
 
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 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 very altar of our national existence, and for the 
 same ideas for which our ancestors — the founders 
 of the original Union, now ashes — laid down 
 their lives. 
 
 I don't mean this to be a sad letter. I am not 
 exactly sad. My feeling is too big a one for that. 
 But I think we are all of us learning to-day to 
 think of death more calmly, more continually, 
 and more philosophically, than we have ever done. 
 We are getting above the sentiment that it is a 
 subject to be avoided, and arriving, quite naturally, 
 at a mood which used only to be common to those 
 who had reached an age at which it was natural 
 and logical to feel that it might be encountered 
 at any moment. I think it a great advance any- 
 way. But we will talk more about that another 
 time. 
 
 Things are pretty quiet here now. 
 
 After the sunny weather which came in to 
 celebrate the entrance of the Stars and Stripes 
 came some pretty cold days, and on one of them, 
 when I was shivering over a tiny fire made of 
 green twigs, came the news that the 1 1 8th had been 
 badly cut up behind Soissons in the last advance, 
 and that of all the little group who had stood 
 about me in the library that sunny Sunday 
 morning, but one was left. 
 
 I just put my cap on and went out to walk. 
 
 I kept telling myself that " it was all right," as 
 I tramped along the road — that in half a century 
 all of us in and about this great struggle, would 
 be safely au delh, and that though men die, and 
 women too, the idea for^which they die to-day is 
 
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 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 immortal. It looks easy on paper, but — my 
 word! — it is not. I have to fight for it. You 
 will soon have to, on your side of the water. 
 
 Activity is the only help. I came back and 
 worked like a dog — my dog does not work at all 
 — tidying up all the stuff left over by the cantonne- 
 ments, making heaps of straw and other debris on 
 the side of the road and trying to burn it. 
 
 I had given it some weeks to dry, but it had 
 not done its part very well. The result is that 
 it is not all burned yet. I light it half a dozen 
 times a day, and it smoulders. Some time I 
 expect it will all be burned, and then we'll spread 
 it over the garden. So, instead of putting any 
 more words on paper, I ought to go out to rake 
 that brush fire up again. 
 
 Incidentally I'll look off at the hill and down 
 the valley. All the fruit trees are in flower. 
 Down the hill towards Conde there are lovely 
 pink clouds which mark the peach trees, and 
 across the Morin, to the south, the plum trees are 
 like dainty white mists. The alleys in the garden 
 at Pere's look like a millinery show, all wreaths 
 of apple blossoms strung on the trellises that 
 border the paths, and the magnolia parasol, which 
 marks, with its spreading shape, the middle of the 
 path, and under which Amelie sits in summer to 
 darn my stockings, is already putting on its young 
 green cover. I am going to send you a photo- 
 graph of that garden path one day. 
 
 Of course we don't talk or think of anything 
 here but the German retreat — Hindenburg's 
 famous strategic retreat. No one denies that the 
 
 6
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 whole thing has been a great lesson in military 
 science, were it not for its accompaniment by acts 
 so unmilitary as to put another blot on the very 
 word " German." 
 
 Every one has a different way of regarding the 
 fact that — possibly to avoid or outwit the 
 threatened Allied spring offensive — Hindenburg 
 felt it prudent to establish a new and stronger 
 line of defence thirty kilometres in the rear of the 
 line he had been holding so long, — a line to-day 
 known as the Siegfried line. Whether or not we 
 were outwitted history will tell us some day in the 
 future — I suppose. The fact from which there 
 is no getting away is that, although this move was 
 rumoured even among civilians as long ago as 
 July of last year, he succeeded in doing it, and 
 that in spite of the fact that the Allied pursuit was 
 prompt and more or less harassed his rear, and 
 perhaps pushed him further and more rapidly 
 than he at first intended. 
 
 Soldiers do not deny the cleverness of the 
 move, but the acts of no military import which 
 accompanied the retreat fill us with horror. To 
 destroy roads and bridges, to cut down forests 
 and raze houses that could have served as shelters 
 or military posts, well, any army would do that. 
 But to poison wells, to uproot orchards, to carry 
 off young girls — these are acts of war that are — 
 to say the least — unmilitary. It is no use talking 
 about it. But what a ruined north-east France it 
 is ! Yet, in spite of that, almost the day after 
 the retreat began the poor refugees who had left 
 in August, 1 9 14, began to hurry back, ready to 
 
 7
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 reconstruct their devastated homes. It is a 
 wonderful spirit, and thank God for it ! It is to 
 be the saving of France. 
 
 I wonder if mere words on paper can make 
 any one realize exactly what has happened. I am 
 sure that, horror-stricken as we have been by 
 some of the details, we have no full sense of it, 
 and how can you, merely reading it in letters of 
 black and white in a newspaper, realize what it 
 is hard for us to take in when it is told us by 
 men who looked on it ? Imagine 264 villages 
 wiped off the map : towns like Chauny, a big 
 industrial centre where there were bleach fields 
 and chemical works, razed : 255 churches and 
 38,000 houses reduced to mere heaps of rubbish. 
 Can you take it in ? I confess that it is hard 
 for me. 
 
 I saw an officer who was in the pursuit who 
 told me that the Boches left groups of women 
 who had been outraged shut up in cellars in the 
 ruined towns and villages, and carried off all the 
 girls in their late teens. What a record for 
 " Kultur " ! Does it not wipe the word out of 
 all decent vocabularies and inscribe it among those 
 forbidden and hidden away in pornographic 
 dictionaries ? 
 
 The demoniac ingenuity of the destruction 
 really surpasses all the demonstrations of German 
 efficiency which this war has yet brought to notice. 
 You have probably read that they sawed down 
 all the orchards and did their utmost to render 
 the fertile soil for a long time unproductive. 
 But that was rather a large order, I am afraid. 
 
 8
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 At any rate they made inanimate objects their 
 infernal aid. They left hidden mines to explode. 
 They left large trees standing, along where roads 
 had once been, sawed almost through, so that the 
 first strong wind would send them crashing on 
 engineers at work repairing the roads or convoys 
 passing in pursuit. My word ! but these Germans 
 give the traditional Old Nick all the trumps in 
 the pack and beat him still in devilishness. 
 
 You remember Coucy-le-Chateau, that mar- 
 vellous ruin, which Violet-le-Duc considered the 
 finest specimen in Europe of medieval military 
 architecture, and which after two hundred and 
 fifty-six years of existence was dismantled by 
 Mazarin in 1652, and has since then been a 
 public monument — a wonderful ruin ? 1 am sure 
 you have climbed over it, every one has, and sat 
 in the shade and looked off at the view. I had 
 a letter the other day from a cavalry officer who 
 is now stationed there, in which he said, " You 
 thought it a ruin when you saw it. You should 
 see it now. The brutes ! " 
 
 In the meantime, the English are still outside 
 St. Quentin, to the very outskirts of which the 
 French cavalry pushed in March. That has 
 always been a fatal spot to the French. It is 
 rather ironical to remember that it was near St. 
 Quentin — which was part of the dower of Mary 
 Queen of Scots — that the French were defeated 
 three hundred and fifty years ago by the allied 
 English, German and Flemish armies, and that 
 there, in January, 1871, the French Armee du 
 Nord was beaten by General Goeben of the 
 
 9
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Prussian forces. I shall feel more easy in my 
 mind once the English are in the town, although 
 we hear that it is largely destoyed — another big 
 factory town — a sort of French Lowell or Lawrence 
 — gone. 
 
 In your last letter you reproach me because I 
 say " nothing about Russia." Yes, I know — 
 Russia is our " great delusion." What can one 
 say ? I have never known much about Russia. 
 I used to think I did. Most of the Russians I 
 knew were revolutionary men who were political 
 exiles here. But I have been no greater fool 
 about it than most of the governments of this 
 world. What can I say except that I suppose 
 they are going to fail us — and then what ? Well, 
 one thing is certain, the curtain is getting torn 
 and we are likely to know more about the 
 Russians than we have ever known — to our cost. 
 You need not bother to twit me that I used to 
 say the " Russians were a great people." Of 
 course I did, and I say it still. They may not 
 prove it until I have gone on, but that is not 
 important. 
 
 You may have the laugh on me. But is it 
 worth while ? You have it on a lot of big people. 
 Let that content you. Besides, the only thing 
 you ever had against the Russians was that they 
 were " queer," and that their language was " hard 
 to learn." And then you did not like the paint- 
 ings they exhibited at the Salon. My reasons 
 for liking them were better than yours for disliking 
 them. I suppose that I shall find excuses for 
 them if the very worst that can happen comes to 
 
 10
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 pass. So don't think you can take any rise out 
 of me on that subject. There are a great many 
 other things that I think about which I do not 
 write to you. To begin with, the censor would 
 work on my letters with his ink brush, and you 
 would be none the wiser, and I would have 
 bothered myself in vain. 
 
 ii
 
 II 
 
 May I, 191 7 
 
 I had hardly mailed my last letter to you when 
 things got very exciting here again. 
 
 Early in the morning of April 24 — that was 
 Tuesday of last week — we heard that the cavalry 
 was trotting into the valley again, and that we 
 were to have the 32nd Dragoons quartered on us. 
 
 Naturally, the first thing I said was, " What 
 a pity it isn't the 23rd," which was so long with 
 us in the winter that we felt it was really our 
 regiment. When the 32nd began to ride in we 
 learned that the 23rd was not far off — only five 
 miles down the valley at La Chapelle,just opposite 
 Crecy-en-Brie. 
 
 Well, I could not complain, for I had another 
 charming young officer in the house — another 
 St. Cyr man, a lieutenant with a de to his name — 
 a man a little over thirty, and very chic. 
 
 On Wednesday — that was the 25th — I was 
 sitting in the library trying to work, when I 
 heard an unusual movement in the road, and 
 looked out to see a group of five officers of the 
 23rd, followed by a couple of orderlies, dismount- 
 ing at the gate — coming to make an afternoon 
 call — all booted and spurred and fresh-gloved and 
 elegant, as if there were no such thing as war, 
 
 12
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 though they were burned and bronzed by the 
 campaign from which they had but just retired. 
 
 It was good to see them again, especially the 
 Aspirant, and though I would have liked to hear 
 all the details of the famous " strategic retreat," 
 I got only a few, as of course you know it is 
 forbidden the soldiers to talk to civilians, and a 
 good thing, too. 
 
 However, I did hear a few interesting things, 
 one of the most striking being that when the 
 French cavalry dashed through Noyon, the poor 
 French people did not recognize them. The 
 population in the invaded district was waiting for 
 the famous pantalon rouge. They did not even 
 know that their army had changed its uniform, 
 and when they saw the blue-grey cavalry coming 
 they thought it was still the enemy and ran to 
 hide again. 
 
 They told me that the joy of these poor people 
 who had been two years and a half under the 
 German heel, when they finally realized that it 
 was their own army which had arrived, was 
 pathetic. 
 
 Hardly had the group of officers taken leave, 
 
 and ridden up the hill, when Lieutenant de G 
 
 came in to sit down for a little chat about home 
 and children. I can't tell you how these men 
 like to talk about home. In the course of the 
 conversation 1 made arrangements with him to 
 have some of his horses and men help in the 
 fields the next morning, for the work here is 
 terribly behind. 
 
 When he went down the hill to dinner I 
 
 13
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 rushed to tell Amelie, and to have everything 
 ready for next morning, and you can imagine my 
 disappointment, when, at nine, Lieutenant de 
 
 G came in, quite disconsolate, to tell me that 
 
 orders had arrived to sound " Boots and Saddles " 
 at half-past six the next morning. 
 
 I ought not to have been surprised, for the 
 officers of the 23rd had told me that it was not a 
 long stay — only an ttape. 
 
 The next morning — that was last Thursday — 
 was a beautiful day. I was up early. I met 
 
 Lieutenant de G on the stairs, where he 
 
 owed over my hand, and made me such a pretty, 
 graceful speech of thanks for my hospitality — you 
 can count on any French soldier, from an officer 
 down to the ranks, doing that. 
 
 I had hardly got out into the garden after he 
 left, when a detachment of the 23rd pulled up at 
 the gate, and the sous-officier in command, saluted, 
 
 as he said : " Aspirant B 's compliments. 
 
 The 23rd is cantonning at Mareuil to-night. I 
 am going ahead to arrange the cantonnement. If 
 it is possible the Aspirant counts on calling on 
 you this afternoon to make his adieux. We 
 march again to-morrow," and with another salute 
 the little troop galloped down the hill. 
 
 The 23rd rode away at half-past seven, and 
 they passed the 6th Dragoons riding in, to take 
 their places. 
 
 The little body of cavalry that came up our 
 hill was in command of a marichal des logis — a 
 handsome, tall, slender lad of not over twenty — 
 who explained that it was only a twenty-four-hours 
 
 H
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 rest for men and horses. They carried no 
 kitchens at all, — no revictualment of any sort. 
 Each man had two days' rations in his sac, and 
 the horses carried their feed-bags and oats. 
 
 It was a new kind of cantonnement for me, and 
 the most picturesque 1 had ever seen. 
 
 When everything had been arranged the 
 marechal des logis came to the door and asked if 
 I could conveniently put him up. 
 
 I led him to his room, and you would have 
 laughed if you could have seen his expression 
 when I showed him the big freshly made-up bed. 
 
 " Am I going to sleep in that ? " he exclaimed, 
 and then we both laughed as if it were a real joke. 
 You see we need so little excuse to laugh these 
 days. 
 
 The weather was beautiful. 
 
 The boys sat or lay all along the roadside in 
 the sun, and the horses, relieved of all equipment, 
 and well brushed, were tethered to the banks and 
 in the courts, wherever there was a blade of grass — 
 in fact they were " turned out to grass " for the 
 first time since last fall — while the soldiers ate 
 and smoked and slept beside them, or rolled, 
 frolicking like youngsters full of spring-time 
 spirit. It was the most unmartial, bucolic sight 
 imaginable. 
 
 There was not much pasturage for the horses, 
 and I looked at my lawn, and at what Louise 
 calls the ■prairie under the fruit trees, and I 
 went out in the road and ceremoniously invited 
 as many of the best-behaved horses as could feed 
 there to come in to lunch. 
 
 !5
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 The marechal des logis was writing letters in the 
 salon when I led my little cavalcade along the 
 terrace — they had selected the most obedient 
 horses who did not even need halters — and he 
 came out to say that it was a pity to trample my 
 lawn — as if I cared for that ! 
 
 You, who so adore horses, would have loved 
 to see them. There was plenty of good feed. 
 There was sunshine and shade, and they nibbled 
 and snorted, while the soldiers who had charge of 
 them rolled on the grass and smoked. I did wish 
 I could have got a snapshot for you, but no one 
 had a camera. 
 
 As it was Thursday Louise was working in the 
 garden— Thursday is her day. Suddenly she 
 shaded her eyes and looked down towards the 
 
 Marne, and called out to me that Aspirant B 
 
 was coming. Sure enough, there he was, coming 
 on foot across the fields as if he had seven-league 
 boots, and waving his cap. Mareuil, where the 
 23rd had gone, is only two miles away. 
 
 He arrived hot and breathless, to explain that, 
 while he was not really out of bounds, still he had 
 not asked permission and so had come on foot, 
 and dared not stay long, but that he could not 
 bear to leave the Seine et Marne without coming 
 to say good-bye, as orders might come at any 
 moment to advance, and no one had the faintest 
 idea what their destination would be. 
 
 I had half a moment's foolish hesitation, as I 
 remembered that the marhhal des logis was in the 
 salon. I did not know what the military etiquette 
 was, or how officers like to meet unceremoniously. 
 
 16
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 So I said : " Shall we sit out here, or will you 
 come into the salon ? The markhal des logis of 
 the 6th is there." 
 
 " Oh, let's join him, of course," replied the 
 Aspirant. 
 
 As I led the way I wondered how I was going 
 to introduce them. I did not know the markhal 's 
 name. But I need not have fretted. 
 
 I opened the door. The markhal sprang erect. 
 The two youngsters — both so tall, so slender and 
 straight — saluted, flung their names at each other, 
 thrust out their hands and gripped. Then they 
 smiled, sat down, crossed their long legs, and fell 
 to. It was like a drill — so exactly in unison — 
 and so young and charming, that I just leaned 
 back in my chair and listened and thought a 
 lot. 
 
 Don't you know how there used to be a 
 tradition about " little Frenchmen " ? 1 vow I 
 don't know where they all are now. I thought 
 of it Wednesday when the group of officers stood 
 about in my salon — their heads almost to the 
 rafters — and I thought of it again to-day as I saw 
 these two twenty-year-olds — both nearly six feet, 
 if not quite. 
 
 When the brief visit was over the lads parted 
 like friends. 
 
 As the Aspirant was saying good-bye on the 
 lawn, and laughing at the idea of my having " the 
 horses in to tea," as he called it, although I called 
 it " spending the day," he directed my attention 
 to the road across the field by which he had 
 arrived, and I looked down, 
 c i 7
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 " Hulloa ! " he exclaimed. " Here comes the 
 23rd racing to visit its pet cantonnement at Huiry. 
 You know, Madame, they never have been so 
 happy anywhere else as they were in what they 
 call ce j oli petit ■pays de Huiry" 
 
 Sure enough, there came Hamelin and Vincent, 
 who had lodged at Amelie's, and Basset and all 
 the rest who had lived about us in December and 
 January. 
 
 So you see we had rather an exciting day. 
 
 The result was that I was very tired, and I 
 slept very soundly. 
 
 As a rule when troops are here I always hear 
 all the night movement. Whenever any officer 
 in the house received a night message, in spite of 
 all their precautions, I invariably heard the cyclist 
 arrive. But that night I heard nothing. I waked 
 at six. I opened my shutters. The sun was 
 shining brightly. The morning was clear and 
 warm. I looked out, wondering at the silence. 
 I expected to see the horses being groomed all 
 along the road. To my surprise all the stable 
 doors were wide open — no one in sight — no 
 horses, no soldiers anywhere. 
 
 When Amelie appeared she said the order had 
 come at midnight. They had marched at three — 
 and I had not heard a sound. Am I not getting 
 used to a military life ? 
 
 But I must give you some evidence that the 
 race famed for its politeness has not lost any of 
 the quality in the war, and all its hurry. 
 
 Although Lieutenant de G , who left 
 
 Thursday morning, had formally thanked me for 
 
 18
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 my hospitality, within twenty-four hours I 
 received the following note from him. 
 
 Madame — 
 
 I must again express to you all my gratitude for the 
 charming welcome you extended to me under your roof. 
 Our roving life did not allow us to stay long at Huiry, 
 but, thanks to you, we shall always cherish a charming 
 recollection of our too short visit. 
 
 And, twenty-four hours after the 6th rode 
 away in the night, I received the following letter 
 from the young marichal des logis. It seems to 
 me such a pretty letter for a lad of twenty that 
 you deserve to see it. 
 
 With the Army, April 28, 19 17 
 
 Madame — 
 
 I hope you will have the kindness to excuse me if, 
 before my departure this morning, I did not have the 
 opportunity of thanking you for the charming welcome 
 you extended to me in your pretty home. It was late 
 when I came in last night, and it was still dark when we 
 took leave of your dear little village this morning, and I 
 was therefore unable to see you, to my deep regret, and 
 to express to you in person all the gratitude I felt, and 
 my deep joy to find that the sympathy which the 
 Americans, our new allies, express for us, is no vain word. 
 Your kindness to us all was the best of evidence, and I 
 beg you to believe, Madame, that the sentiment is 
 reciprocated. 
 
 All my men, as well as my two comrades and I, were 
 deeply touched by the welcome extended to us in your 
 village, and especially by you in person, and we should 
 have been only too happy had we been able to stay with 
 you longer. We are much less comfortable to-night 
 than we were last night, but a soldier is forced to consider 
 
 l 9
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 himself comfortable anywhere. All the same he is more 
 than happy, now and then, to find himself among kind 
 people who offer him the comforts of home of which he 
 has been deprived for nearly three years. Even our 
 horses are less gay than they were yesterday. This 
 afternoon they had no green lawn to nibble. 
 I beg you, dear Madame, etc., 
 
 MARiCHAL DES LOGIS G . 
 
 The politeness of these French boys and their 
 aptness in writing letters promptly is remarkable. 
 It is a national characteristic. It is a great contrast 
 to the American sans gene manner, which surprises 
 French people. For example, all the French 
 soldiers nursed in our little ambulance write 
 immediately they get back to the Directrice, the 
 Sisters, and their special nurse to reiterate the 
 thanks they have so profusely expressed before 
 leaving, and any one to whom I have shown the 
 smallest courtesy while there writes to me. The 
 little hospital has never sheltered but one American. 
 When he returned to his post every one gave him 
 an address, and every one expected a postcard 
 from him, at least. Of course he could not write 
 French, but he could send a picture postcard with 
 his' name, and a line which he knew I would 
 render into French. No word ever came back. 
 Dear Sceur Jules is sure he is dead. 1 never 
 see her but she asks : " Have you had news 
 
 from ? " And when I say, " No," she 
 
 shakes her head sadly, and exclaims, " Poor lad ! 
 Of course he has been killed. Poor nice boy ! 
 We were so attached to him." I let it go at that. 
 It is so hard to explain that it is very American. 
 
 20
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Lovely day — so good after the terrible winter. 
 
 I am alreading planting peas and beans and 
 potatoes. But the flower garden will not be very 
 pretty this year, I lost so many rose bushes in the 
 awful long spell of January and February cold. 
 But what of that ? Potatoes are the only chic 
 thing this year. They are planted everywhere — 
 on the lawn at the chateau, in the front gardens, 
 under the fruit trees. I was tempted to plant 
 them on my lawn, only that would have been 
 pretentious, as Pere had more land than we needed, 
 and it would have cost more to turn up my lawn 
 than the mere patriotic look of the thing was 
 worth. 
 
 21
 
 Ill 
 
 May 1 8, 19 1 7 
 
 Just the loveliest day you can imagine. When 
 1 went into the garden early this morning I did 
 wish you were here. A soft puffy breeze was 
 blowing, and a thin haze veiled the sun. There 
 was only one word for it — divine. I never see 
 the country looking as it did at that moment that 
 I do not long to own a big camera and become an 
 expert with it. It would only be in that way one 
 could ever get a proper picture of it. It is so 
 wilfully changeable that to do it justice — to catch 
 it at its best — the camera would have to be on the 
 spot — ever ready. 
 
 We have had a week of really hot weather. It 
 has been good for planting, and I've planted carrots 
 and turnips and beets and onions, tomatoes and 
 cucumbers, and if this lasts, I am going to try 
 golden bantam corn. What do you think of that 
 for a farmer ? Hush — Louise does the hard work, 
 and I boss it. I sit in the field on a camp chair 
 with the seeds in a basket, and a green umbrella 
 over my head, and big gloves on my hands, while 
 Louise grovels in the dirt and carries out my ideas. 
 I get terribly tired, and very red in the face, but 
 Louise, brown as a berry, comes out fresh as 
 possible. 
 
 22
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Well, anyway, I am going to have something to 
 eat — in time — and that comforts me. 
 
 At noon to-day it clouded over, and a cold wind 
 came up which drove me indoors. Though it is 
 as cold here as outside, still I am out of the wind, 
 and that is how it happens that, though I have 
 nothing much to write about, I am going to try 
 to make a letter. Everything in the world is 
 still — but though we hear no sound of cannon, I 
 have the thought of it always with me. It is 
 more persistent than the poor. 
 
 I have been looking over some of your letters, 
 and I find that you have often asked me questions 
 about my beasties, and because I have almost 
 always had other things to write about I have 
 never got to telling you about anything in the 
 beastie line, except cats — and you got that, you 
 remember, because you were nasty about my 
 efforts to " wake up the States," which had been 
 hardly less successful at that time than King 
 George's great " Wake Up, England ! ' 
 
 Well, since you want to hear about beasties, so 
 be it. 
 
 Of course, you remember that in the old days 
 I never had any beasties in the apartment, except 
 birds. When I came out into the country to live 
 I did not see any place either in my little house 
 or in my new life for that huge cage and the 
 twenty birds that lived in it, in Paris. 
 
 I had loved them in the Paris apartment. High 
 up in the air, with that broad open space across 
 the Montparnasse Cemetery to fill the wide balcony 
 with sunlight and warmth, they had seemed quite 
 
 23
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 in the picture. But the idea of caged birds on 
 this hilltop seemed to me silly. What happiness 
 could a cageful of birds have when surrounded 
 by singing birds in liberty ? Also every one out 
 here kept cats. 
 
 In Paris, high up above the street, the morning 
 concerts had been the only gay thing in the sad 
 and lonely house. I learned to love them. I 
 loved giving them their bath in the morning, 
 doing up their house for them, and preparing their 
 meals. I loved seeing them flying about, dancing 
 and singing, swinging and balancing, and eating. 
 
 I loved believing they were happy. But I 
 could not imagine them happy out here, so they 
 did not come with me. 1 gave them and their 
 gilded palace to some one whom they had always 
 known, and now and then I still go to see them. 
 
 So when I came out here I had no beasties. 
 
 The first one I had was a dog. He was a 
 beautiful Airedale — a big dog with a dear chestnut- 
 coloured head and legs and belly, and a nicely 
 fitting, undulated, black jacket. But, alas ! I 
 did not have him long, and it was altogether a sad 
 experience. 
 
 When he arrived he was homesick. 
 
 Did you ever see a homesick dog ? Or, what 
 is worse, did you ever live with one ? For days, 
 before he learned to love me, he followed me 
 about in a patient, resigned way which made me 
 pretty sad. I had not had much experience in 
 owning beasties, except birds. I had to get 
 acquainted as well as he. It was hard on both of 
 us. Besides, the house was all fresh and clean, 
 
 2 4
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 and, as I was determined that he should feel that 
 it was as much his home as mine, he was allowed 
 everywhere, and brought in a lot of dirt, and my 
 habit of having everything in apple-pie order — by 
 the way, what kind of order is that ? — got a shock. 
 But I grew used to all that, and reconciled to 
 it, as he became attached to me, and, even in the 
 little time he stayed, I got so that I did not mind 
 when he leaped all over me, and wiped his muddy 
 paws, and he could not walk out with me without 
 embracing me every few minutes. I was so grate- 
 ful to him for showing pleasure in my society, 
 that for a while I did not even try to break him 
 of it. I ended by getting deeply attached to. him, 
 and he to me. I was so proud of him. 1 loved 
 walking out with him, carrying his leash and 
 whip, with a whistle in my sweater pocket. He 
 was naturally obedient. He always walked close 
 to my heels except when I told him to "go," and 
 then he was off like a flash. But he never went 
 out of sight. If he reached a turn, he stopped to 
 look back and see if I were coming, and if I hid 
 he dashed back and sniffed around until he found 
 me. Of course this is all common-place to people 
 who have always had dogs of their own. But it 
 was a new experience to me. 
 
 If he saw any one coming towards me he retired 
 quietly to my side — not as if afraid, but as if to 
 assure himself that I was not going to be molested. 
 For a few weeks that was all right. He seemed 
 gentle and was as playful, once he was domiciled, 
 as a small dog. 
 ' I had never had a watch-dog — didn't know 
 
 25
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 anything about them. I had him for company. 
 But one day Amelie was sweeping the terrace. 
 Argus was lying in the sun. I was standing at 
 the gate, which was closed. The postman came 
 up the road and started to open the gate. Argus 
 was there in one bound. He snarled, then growled 
 deep down in his throat. The man did not come in. 
 
 Amelie laughed aloud. Instinctively I said, 
 " No, no, Argus ! " but Amelie simply screamed 
 at me : "Laissez done" and she patted him on the 
 head. "At last," she said. "I was wondering 
 if that dog was anything but beautiful. Pat his 
 head," she commanded, " and tell him he is a good 
 dog." I obeyed orders, and Argus wagged his 
 tail, and strutted, and from that day he was the 
 terror of the commune. He never passed any one 
 on the road without growling, and he barked at 
 every one who passed the gate. 
 
 Personally I thought he carried his ardour too 
 far, since he could not bear a stranger near. He 
 barked when they arrived, and he kept it up. 
 Every one was afraid of him, though I was always 
 convinced that he was not a dangerous dog. He 
 never attacked any one. On the road he always 
 came the instant he was called, and patiently 
 allowed himself to be leashed. 
 
 I confess I never got at his psychology — he 
 did not live long enough. As I say, he never 
 attempted to attack any one, though he did attack 
 a big dog. He never attached himself to any one 
 outside of the household. I had heaps of theories 
 about him. At times I thought there was a savage 
 strain in him. At other times 1 imagined he was 
 
 26
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 as afraid of people as they were of him. But I 
 don't know. 
 
 When he was ill, and I sent for the veterinary, 
 Argus was upstairs lying at my bedroom door when 
 the doctor arrived. I called him. He came half- 
 way down the stairs and stood barking. The doctor 
 said : " As handsome an Airedale as 1 ever saw, 
 but I would not touch him for a fortune." 
 
 " But, doctor," I said, " he's perfectly gentle." 
 
 " With you, perhaps. I can't touch him." 
 
 So I went upstairs with the dog, and he let me 
 tie up his nose, and I held him while the doctor 
 examined him. 
 
 Well — he died. Never mind about that. I 
 don't like even now to remember it. I like to 
 think of him as we used to walk out together, 
 when he was the first comrade of my new life. 
 
 Oh yes, I have another dog now, but he is just 
 a dog to me. I like him well enough, and play 
 with him, but my heart is not set on him as it was 
 on my big dog of whom I was so proud. 
 
 This dog's name is Dick. He is a big black 
 poodle and a perfect fool. He is what the French 
 call pas mechant pour deux sous, just a common 
 or garden fool. He is a thoroughbred, but he 
 has never been trained at all, and as he was nearly, 
 if not quite, four years old when he came — with 
 his character — training has been impossible. He 
 was bought when a baby as a plaything for a child 
 at Couilly. When the war broke out, his family 
 went to Switzerland and left Dick a boarder at 
 Amelie's. At Couilly he left a bad reputation. 
 A child hacl hit him with a stick and hurt him, and 
 
 27
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Dick had sprung on her — the one naughty act of 
 his life, but it was enough to give him a bad name 
 — so he had to come up here to live. 
 
 No one knows everything about a dog except 
 after long years of experience. Though he is the 
 silliest, gentlest, most playful dog in the world, 
 though he adores children, and the cats sleep all 
 over him, I have to own that he has never for- 
 gotten the child at Couilly who struck him with 
 the big stick, and the very sight of her to-day — 
 after more than live years — brings out a quality 
 of ugliness in him that he never shows at any 
 other time. Apart from that one trait he is a 
 comic, frolicsome dog, whose delight in life is to 
 " go," and whose dream of happiness is to have 
 any one, no matter whom, throw stones for him. 
 
 He was boarding at Am61ie's when I came here. 
 While Argus lived he never came near the house. 
 But after Argus had gone Amelie used to bring 
 him down here with her, and I got used to seeing 
 him about. Neither Amelie nor Abelard had 
 been content that there was no dog here at night, 
 and finally 1 consented to let Dick sleep in the 
 kennel ; he has been sleeping there ever since. 
 The only protection he gives is to bark when any 
 one approaches the house, and that is really all 
 that is necessary. When he barks furiously in 
 the night — as every one knows his voice — some 
 one comes to be sure that I am all right. 
 
 When I say he barks at every one, that's not 
 quite true. He used to bark at every one, but, 
 for some reason, since we have had so many 
 soldiers cantonned here, he never barks at a poilu^ 
 
 28
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 It is the only exception. He barks at the children, 
 at the postman, at the neighbours he sees every 
 day on the road, but he never barks in these 
 days at a soldier. Droll, that, I think ! I have 
 asked him to explain himself, but I am too stupid 
 to understand. 
 
 Of course Melie has a big dog — a black 
 retriever — who, though he is already huge, is 
 hardly more than a puppy. He came last winter, 
 and I named him Marquis, and it was at once 
 abbreviated into Kiki. Amelie brought him in 
 her apron one night when he was about as big as 
 a small cat, and showed him to Khaki and Didine. 
 Khaki gave one look at him, and asked for the 
 door. He shrugged his shoulders as he went out 
 with very stiff legs and a line of bristling hair 
 down his back, as much as to say " Another ? 
 Dear me ! ' But Didine went up to him as he 
 lay on Melie's knee, examined him, and deliber- 
 ately cuffed him first on one side of his head, and 
 then on the other, and hard cuffs, too. Marquis 
 has grown up since then, but he has no taste for 
 cats. 
 
 Although Marquis is still only a puppy, he is 
 already much bigger than Dick, and Dick is still 
 just as much of a puppy — and will be to the end 
 of his days — and it is lovely to see them play to- 
 gether — such races and boxing matches as they 
 have ! They don't always observe the Rules of 
 the Marquis of Queensberry to be sure, but they 
 never get cross over their game. Marquis is just 
 as good a sport as Dick, but though he is heavier 
 he does not tire so easily, and often when Dick 
 
 29
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 retires to his corner to get his breath back and lies 
 with his tongue hanging out, Marquis goes and 
 pulls him into the ring by his hind leg. 
 
 So there you have the dogs that run with me 
 when I cross the fields. I have to keep them 
 with me as all dogs must be leashed or muzzled. 
 I carry muzzles and whip and whistle when I 
 walk, and, as they are both obedient to the 
 whistle, I can call them if I see any one approach- 
 ing, and get them on their leashes if I don't have 
 time to muzzle them. Some time, if I get a 
 chance, I'll ask them to send you their pictures. 
 
 Though I don't have birds, I have hens and 
 chickens. I have four hens setting at Am61ie's 
 now. I don't want anything of that sort round 
 here. So I have arranged an imitation of a basse- 
 cour and hen-house at Amelie's. You'd laugh if 
 you could see it. I began it last summer. I sent 
 Am61ie to town to buy a dozen chickens — ten of 
 them proved to be cocks, so we fed them to be 
 eaten, and bought another dozen, with hardly 
 better luck, except in the matter of winter food. 
 I began the spring with a rooster and seven hens, 
 and every one of those hens shall sit if she wants 
 to. Amelie pulls a long face, and says, " How 
 are you going to feed them ? " Well, if I can't 
 I can eat them, or give them to other people 
 to eat. 
 
 Food is a very interesting question in these 
 days. Besides, hens are about the only creatures 
 I can contemplate eating with equanimity. They 
 are amusing enough at feeding time, but they are 
 ugly, selfish, unlovable birds, except when they 
 
 3o
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 have a brood of fluffy little ones about their feet, 
 and then they are adorable. 
 
 The most amusing experience I have ever had 
 was with goats — and that one experience impressed 
 on me the fact that I'd need several more years of 
 training to become a real farmer, or a stock-breeder 
 — perhaps even another incarnation. 
 
 When milk got short it was a serious dilemma, 
 and the future looked even more serious. Milk 
 is a very important item in my diet, and how we 
 were to get through another winter short of milk 
 was a question. 
 
 One day Amelie remarked that if we had a 
 goat, it would be some help, as she and Pere 
 liked goat's milk. So, one day, at Meaux, I told 
 her I'd make her a present of a goat, if she could 
 find one. I was amazed when she came back to 
 the wagon carrying the cunningest little beastie in 
 her arms you ever saw. 
 
 " Why, Melie," I cried, " that won't give any 
 milk ! " 
 
 "Give it time," she replied. "It is such a 
 pretty one." 
 
 So I named it Jeannette, and it came to live 
 "at the farm." 
 
 It was as frisky as a kitten and we all made a 
 plaything of it. It followed Melie up and down 
 from her house to mine, and when it got to know 
 the way it came by itself to call. I was eternally 
 catching it in my garden, standing on its hind 
 legs, nibbling my rose-bushes, and picking it up 
 in my arms and carrying it home. But it was so 
 fascinating on its stiff", wooden, peglike legs, and 
 
 31
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 it side-stepped so gracefully when I was catching 
 it, and danced on its hind feet, and butted at 
 me sideways, that I could not get cross. 
 
 Sometimes I'd hear a rustle in the hedge as I 
 was reading in the shade, and, going out to the 
 gate to see what was trying to get through, would 
 find Jeannette standing on her hind legs, eating 
 the old hedge with all her might. I didn't mind 
 that. It did not hurt the hedge to be trimmed. 
 But when she began to eat pansies, roses, and 
 geraniums, I drew the line, and protested. I 
 drove her home one day, and began to ask myself 
 if other goats had as much liberty as Jeannette, 
 and decided that they did not, and that, in fact, 
 she was being badly brought up. 
 
 I looked over the fields and saw goats nibbling, 
 each with a long rope attached to a stake. 
 
 So I went up to Amelie's to have a serious talk 
 about the upbringing of her goat. I found Pere 
 — it was just afternoon — taking his nap in a big 
 chair wi'th Jeannette hugged in his arms as she 
 lay on his knees. 
 
 I had to laugh. It was not a moment to 
 argue. 
 
 The proper moment came a few days later. 
 
 It was early in the morning. I heard some one 
 talking angrily in the road, and it only took a 
 little listening to discover that Jeannette had been 
 in a neighbour's garden and made a good meal of 
 peas. The owner was angry, and I did not blame 
 her. It was one thing for Jeannette to destroy my 
 garden or Pere's, but quite another matter when 
 she went trespassing and laid us liable to a prods. 
 
 32
 
 THE PEAK OF THELOAD 
 
 This time I stiffened my lips — I hate to argue 
 with Melie — and just went at the job. I empha- 
 tically stated that it was absurd to let a destructive 
 animal like a goat roam at liberty, that goats were 
 usually attached, and that there was no reason 
 why Jeannette should not be. By the time I had 
 done, Melie was in tears. 
 
 "Poor Jeannette!" she sobbed. "She loves 
 her liberty, and I love mine, and can sympathize. 
 Poor Jeannette, I know just how she feels." 
 
 Of course I had to say, " Sorry, Melie, but we 
 did not buy the goat for a plaything, and you 
 know as well as I do that she cannot always run 
 free, so one time is as good as another. There is 
 plenty of place for her to eat. There is a little 
 meadow out under the trees where she can be tied 
 up. She will be near the house, and the grass 
 there is full of all sorts of good things — dande- 
 lions, chicory, sanfoin, and there is the court here, 
 and there is the little enclos at the top of the hill 
 where we put the horse and donkey, and there 
 is the grassland up the hill, and when once the 
 cassis is gathered, she can be put there." 
 
 " Oh," replied Amelie, " there are places enough, 
 if it must be done." 
 
 It was done, but it was too late to be done with 
 comfort to any one. Jeannette had been made a 
 family pet. She was used to company. Wher- 
 ever we put her she b-1-laated for hours at a time, 
 unless one of us went and sat with her. 1 pro- 
 tested, but I used to catch Amelie taking her 
 sewing to sit with Jeannette, and Pere used to go 
 and lie near her on the ground to take his noon 
 
 D 33
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 nap — and as long as she lived, she would never be 
 cured of that longing for society, if not for liberty. 
 
 Well, the time came when Jeannette became 
 a mother. It was about the quickest performance 
 I ever knew of. It was a Thursday. Louise 
 was working in the garden, as is usual on all 
 Thursdays. She had gone to Pere's to carry 
 a wheelbarrow of grass — we had cut the lawn. I 
 saw her returning without the wheelbarrow on a 
 quick run, calling as she came, £c Is there any hot 
 water ? Jeannette has got twins ! " 
 
 I did not wait for Louise to get the hot water. 
 I just sprinted — in my way — for the stable. There 
 were the little long-legged things — walking, if you 
 please, while Jeannette looked over her shoulder 
 at them in wide-eyed surprise. Talk about 
 cunning things ! They beat all I had ever seen. 
 They were both white. One had a thin black line 
 down his spine to his cute little stub of a tail, and 
 the other had a similar black line half as long. 
 On the spot I named them — it's my way — Pierre 
 and Paul. 
 
 For a few weeks those little goats were my 
 everyday amusement. They were playful as kittens. 
 We used to attach Jeannette up the road in an 
 open field, and leave Pierre and Paul with her, 
 but if 1 dared to heave in sight, both the little 
 beasties rushed to meet me. Then Jeannette set 
 up a yell, and I had to catch them and take them 
 back. Then I was as bad as Amelie, for I would 
 sit in the shade and watch them. The field was 
 up a bank, and they used to butt each other down, 
 and dance and do side-steps until I used to call 
 
 34
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Amelie to come and look at them, and we would 
 both sit, like a pair of geese, and laugh. I forgot as 
 much as she ever had what the goat was bought for. 
 
 Pierre was a bit more venturesome than Paul. 
 He was always the leader. The only queer thing 
 was that they never varied their methods. For 
 example, they would both come close to the door, 
 and turning their heads sideways, look in. Then 
 Pierre ventured in, and Paul followed. The 
 dining-room was always darkened in the daytime 
 to keep it cool, but the door was open. Pierre, 
 followed by Paul, would come and look, and 
 then, although there was no sill, bound in as 
 though over a barrier, and, after a moment's 
 hesitation, Paul did the same thing. There was 
 hardly a day they did not come, and they never 
 varied the antic, nor failed, when I went to catch 
 them and put them in the stable at night, to side- 
 step, bound sidewise on their hind legs, and butt 
 at me with such a pretty turn of the head. But 
 no one ever drew a picture or made an image of a 
 goat in any other movement, so all goats must do 
 it. Only these were the first with which I had 
 ever been intimate. 
 
 Well, all country idyls end in tragedy. 
 
 Last Saturday — Saturday is market day at 
 Meaux — after I had taken my coffee, which 1 got 
 myself, as Amelie and Pere had arranged to go 
 to market early on account of the heat — 1 went 
 up to the pasture to see why Jeannette was 
 crying so. I found her still tied in the stable 
 instead of in the pasture, as I had expected, and 
 there was no Pierre and Paul. 
 
 35
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 I had a sort of sudden premonition. I went 
 back, and sat in the garden until I heard the 
 wagon coming. I gave one look at Melie's red 
 eyes. I did not have to ask. I knew that Pierre 
 and Paul had gone to market. 
 
 Jeannette did not get over crying for days. 
 
 Well, as Pere remarked, " She was bought to 
 give us milk." 
 
 You see, next time I'll know how to bring up 
 a goat. I can only be thankful I don't get 
 attached to chickens. I've that much luck. 
 
 You can't call this a war letter, can you ? The 
 real absolute truth is that just now it is hard to 
 believe there is any war, it is so calm and still 
 here, and the nights are heavenly. I often sit 
 out until midnight, and I have even fallen asleep 
 with my head on my arms, simply hating to come 
 indoors and leave all the beauty of the night. 1 
 wish often that I had one of those tents in which 
 the Virginia boys slept on our common. I think 
 it will be the next thing I present myself. 
 
 You can never realize the wonder of the nights 
 here until you see them. It is not dark until 
 after ten — summer-time, of course. There is no 
 sound except from the passing trains, and nothing 
 breaks the line of the hills, except, now and then, 
 the end of a searchlight from the other side, a 
 thin line only, but it visualizes " war," reminding 
 us that the watch is kept. 
 
 Of course we have all been bitterly disappointed 
 again that the push does not go on. We don't 
 understand, but we must have faith in those who 
 do — or we hope, do. 
 
 36
 
 IV 
 
 June 15, 1 91 7 
 
 I have been so busy learning to be a farmer 
 that during the last three weeks I have had no 
 time to write letters. I have read the newspapers, 
 tried to be patient, and been up to Paris. That's 
 my life. 
 
 We have had lovely hot weather and every- 
 thing is growing well. Still, in spite of rains in 
 May, just after I wrote to you, which seemed to 
 me sufficient to wet the ground, every one is 
 yelling for rain. I confess the ground does 
 look dry. 
 
 Yesterday nine chicks came out of a nest of 
 thirteen eggs. I was delighted, but Amelie is 
 disappointed. They ought all to have hatched. 
 I recognized that, when she called my attention 
 to it. Until then I had thought it a brave 
 showing. I shall do better next time, or, if I 
 don't, be wiser in speech. 
 
 I went up to Paris on June 3rd and stayed a 
 whole week, which was unusual for me, but I 
 had work to do there and could not seem to get 
 back. I wish you could have seen my garden 
 when 1 did. It was like a wilderness of flowers. 
 It looked absolutely unkept, although it was 
 clean and tidy. But no one would dream of 
 
 37
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 cutting the roses when 1 am not here, and the 
 Gloire de Dijon over the front door, and the big 
 Pink Rover over the dining-room, had bloomed 
 and bloomed and shed their petals until the air 
 was full of them. The grass was high, the 
 geraniums and pinks a mass of colour. I would 
 not have dreamed that a week or ten days could 
 have done the work it had, although, of course, 
 it was hot weather. 
 
 In Paris no one talked of anything but the 
 taking of Messines, and now that the Allies have 
 the three heights — Bapaume taken in March, 
 Vimy in April, and Messines last Monday, — 
 every one is hoping for another phase of a general 
 offensive. Wise and well-informed people say it 
 is impossible, and the gospel of patience is 
 preached everywhere. All the same Messines 
 was a great affair, one of the most astounding 
 bits of preparation the war has yet seen. 
 
 We surely needed that bit of encouragement, 
 with all the disquieting things that are going on 
 in Russia, and with the perpetual disturbances of 
 the Socialists and Pacifists, who find it so hard to 
 understand even yet that peace to-day can only 
 be a German peace, with Germany not only 
 victor, but conqueror. Before this war can end 
 well all the hopes of any decency or generosity or 
 good breeding or justice on the part of the 
 Germans must be wiped out of the minds of 
 every race she is fighting. The Allies must quit 
 talking, quit explaining their position, which is 
 clearly known now, and get down to work. This 
 struggle will never be settled except by guns and 
 
 38
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 aeroplanes, and it is waste effort to talk about 
 Germany until she is beaten to her knees, and 
 until she is, though this war lasts twenty years, 
 it will never end. As a well-known American 
 man said to one of my friends in Paris, " Our 
 boys must not come over here to get licked," and 
 unless Germany is licked they will be. 
 
 Day before yesterday we began to gather 
 cherries. They are not very plentiful, and as for 
 prunes — almost none. However, we have enough 
 for ourselves, and as we have almost no sugar, 
 the scarcity is not so disturbing as it would be 
 otherwise. But it deprives the pockets here of 
 sous y and they need them. 
 
 To-day is a very hot day. It is so hot that 
 Pere left for Meaux to take a few things to 
 market before four, and was back for his coffee 
 at seven. 
 
 You see how we occupy ourselves here in 
 spite of the war. At this minute, but for the 
 newspapers, which, in the silence, we read and 
 try to understand, and but for the soldiers in our 
 ambulance — more sick than wounded just now — 
 and but for such heart-breaking affairs as the 
 air raids on London when school-children were 
 killed, we seem at times almost as far off from the 
 war as you are. We do not get used to it. No one 
 ever will, but more and more we are beginning to 
 understand that if war is to be we must prepare 
 to meet all the atrocities of a nation like Germany, 
 fighting for its mistaken ideas, and its continued 
 existence on a wrong road. The world had no 
 right to let itself be taken by surprise. Germany 
 
 39
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 had never made any secret of her ambitions. 
 Apart from all the military and economic books 
 in which all her ideas of her future development 
 and her belief in conquest have been clearly set 
 down, no German writer on any subject has been 
 able to escape putting the ideas into books of no 
 matter what nature. Even as long ago as 1861 
 Hermann Grimm in an article on Emerson, after 
 prophesying one Church and one State, remarked : 
 " But what next ? The strife will then be to 
 make this one sovereignty the Germanic, to which 
 the Slav, the Mongolian, the Romanic, and what- 
 ever other races are called, shall submit," and less 
 than twenty years later (1879), James E. Hosmer, 
 a professor of German literature in St. Louis, in 
 spite of an intelligent effort to deal justly with 
 the comparative struggles of England, Germany 
 and the States, announced his opinion that the 
 world was slowly being Germanized. After all, 
 who knows, if, but for this stupid war, his 
 prophecy might not have become true ? There 
 is no doubt in any of our minds that the world 
 had been in a way hypnotized by Germany ever 
 since 1870. If the Hohenzollerns had not re- 
 turned to the methods of the days of Hannibal, 
 there is no knowing what might have happened. 
 Listen to what I came across accidentally the 
 other day, about old times when " upon their 
 great white shields they slide down the slopes of 
 the Alps to do battle. They have armour of 
 brass and helmets fashioned into resemblance 
 of heads of beasts of prey. The women fight by 
 the side of their husbands, then, as priestesses, slay 
 
 40
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 the prisoners, letting the blood run into brazen 
 caldrons that it may offer an omen. Even the 
 Romans are terrified, veterans though they are 
 from the just ended struggle with Hannibal. 
 Papirius Carbo goes down before them, and Rome 
 expects to see in her streets the blonde Northman, 
 as she had just before looked for the dark-skinned 
 Numidian. Caius Marius meets them, ioo B.C. 
 in southern Gaul, and again in northern Italy, 
 the front rank of their hosts — that they may 
 stand firm — bound together man by man, with a chain, 
 and the fierce women waiting in the rear with uplifted 
 axes to slay all cowards. But Marius comes off 
 conqueror from the corpse-heaped battle-fields, 
 and Rome has a respite ! " 
 
 I have always told you, the world does not 
 change — and how more than true it is that 
 history repeats itself. Our age and time has been 
 deaf to the warnings of the past, and blind to the 
 writing on the wall. Yet even that is the virtue 
 of a failing. It is dangerous' to think too well of 
 a people, but it is, after all, a generous fault. 
 Germany's is the reverse — she thinks too ill of 
 every one but herself, arid knows herself as little 
 as she knows other people. 
 
 If you have handy a book containing Grimm's 
 essay on Frederick the Great and Macaulay, do 
 read it, just for phrases like this : 
 
 " That a German should write a history of 
 France, Italy, Russia, or Turkey would seem no 
 wise unsuitable, or contradictory, but imagine an 
 Italian, Frenchman, or Turk writing a history of 
 Germany ! If the book by chance imposed on 
 
 4 1
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 some innocent mind because written in a foreign 
 language it would only be necessary to translate 
 it." 
 
 Well, by their own acts they have impeached 
 themselves — and late as it is, it is lucky for the 
 world that it is not later. 
 
 I suppose it will not be long now before our 
 boys begin to arrive, but I have no mad expectation 
 of their being fit for action before the end of the 
 year, if they are then. Kitchener's first mob was 
 dressed for the field in eight months, but England 
 is nearer than the States, and the submarines were 
 not so active in 19 15 as they are now. It is not 
 only a long way to Tipperary— it is a mighty long 
 way to New York. The only prayer I ever feel 
 like saying these days — and even that is against 
 my habits, for I don't believe as much in asking 
 for things as I do in being grateful for them — is : 
 " Hurry up, America ! May the Allies hold out 
 until you get here." 
 
 Though I say so little about the war, and 
 although we keep on doing the little ordinary 
 things of everyday life — we must, you know — 
 our hearts are all out there in the north, where, 
 since the so-called strategic retreat, some of the 
 toughest fighting in the war has written Craonne, 
 Tete de Conde and Chemin des Dames in letters 
 of fire on our memories. The beginning of these 
 things happened away back in April, but the news 
 we get is so meagre in details that it is only now 
 that we realize all the heroism of the effort, or are 
 able to put a proper name on the battles. Of 
 course we did get the news of the wonderful 
 
 4 2
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 English work at Messines eight days ago, at once. 
 That was such a noisy affair that it could not be 
 kept out of notice, besides it had been preparing 
 for so long, and was so soon over. I am told 
 they heard the explosion in London, when the 
 long-prepared mines were touched ofF. It was 
 one of the things we did not hear here. 
 
 Well, Constantine is off his throne — another 
 wandering crowned head to be a political danger 
 to the future. At any rate it will protect us from 
 getting a blow in the back down there, though it 
 comes at a late day. Next ! 
 
 43
 
 V 
 
 July 5, 1917 
 
 Well, the first of our boys have marched in 
 the streets of Paris. 
 
 I did not see them. I was not able to go up 
 to town, nor was I in the mood to see such a 
 procession. So in honour of the day — it was 
 July 4th — I put up all my flags, and waited to 
 hear about the enthusiasm with which the boys 
 were received, from other people. 
 
 The day before, Petain had addressed the 
 French army in these words — 
 
 " To-morrow, the anniversary of the Declaration 
 of Independence of the United States of America, 
 the first American troops to land in France will 
 march in Paris. Soon after they will join us at 
 the front. 
 
 u Salutations to our new comrades in arms, who, 
 without arriere-pensie of money or conquest, 
 inspired simply by the desire to defend the cause 
 of justice and liberty, have come to take their 
 place at our side. 
 
 " Other divisions are preparing to follow them. 
 
 " The United States of America is prepared to 
 place at our disposition, without regarding the 
 cost, her soldiers, her factories, her ships — the 
 entire resources of her country. They are in- 
 
 44
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 spired by a desire to pay a hundred-fold the debt 
 of gratitude they feel to Lafayette and his 
 comrades. 
 
 " With one voice, on this Fourth of July, let 
 the cry go up from every point on our front, 
 1 Honour to the great Sister Republic ! Vivent 
 les Etats-Unis ! ' " 
 
 The order was obeyed with spirit. It was one 
 great echo of the cheers that split the air in April, 
 and yesterday America owned Paris. One of my 
 friends who was there wrote me last night : " I 
 wonder you did not hear the cheers on the Hill- 
 top. The walls of Paris shook with them. And 
 Pershing had tears rolling down his cheeks as he 
 rode through the shouting crowds." 
 
 I would have liked to know what he thought 
 of Paris, as the capital of an invaded country. I 
 am afraid it will prove a terrible temptation to 
 our boys, for there is no question that Paris has 
 a charm which few can resist long. I guarantee 
 that before long the States will hear all sorts of 
 tales about the unlicensed acts of our boys in 
 their first encounter with an atmosphere so new 
 to them, and a people so strange to them. Don't 
 let that worry you. It is a phase which was to be 
 foreseen, and was logically impossible to prevent. 
 A large percentage of our boys — whose last 
 thought was that they would ever be soldiers sent 
 to fight on foreign soil — know nothing about the 
 French. They have all heard of Paris as a " gay 
 city," where wonderful things take place, and of 
 France as a country where things are permitted 
 which would not be tolerated at home. You 
 
 45
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 know no race belies itself in its light literature as 
 the French. And it is the light literature which 
 is the most known in translations. To judge by 
 that, women are never virtuous, men are never 
 loyal, and we all know how often it has been said 
 that " home " has no equivalent in French because 
 the thing itself does not exist here. You and I 
 know France better than that. We know that 
 nowhere in all the world is home life more beauti- 
 ful, or family ties stronger than where the words 
 ma mere are sacred, and where father and son 
 are not ashamed to embrace in public. If there 
 is less hypocrisy of speech and opinion about 
 some of the natural incidents of human experience 
 that exists in some other parts of the world, those 
 who draw too quick conclusions from that will be 
 liable to find themselves mistaken. If the French 
 make less fuss than we do about certain accidents 
 of life, it is to their credit, and they are only a bit 
 in advance of the rest of the world — in the van- 
 guard of advance — in fact, the banner-bearers, as 
 they always have been, of civilization. Then, 
 besides, you know, and the world will know when 
 this is over, that the so-called " emotional French " 
 are less hysterical than we are. 
 
 So don't you worry over any of the tales 
 about the American boys in Paris which are sure 
 to go across by cable and special correspondents. 
 Over here our boys will grow into self-reliant, 
 self-respecting men. They will be broken of 
 many of the bad habits which we have to know 
 exist, and they will go home — such of them as 
 return — to build up a new type of American.. 
 
 4 6
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Hardships will model their faces, which when I 
 was last in New York looked too round and 
 pudgy ; exercise will harden their frames which 
 were too tnolle. In fact, they will be in every 
 way the better. They will leave a great heritage 
 to the future and make a race with a right to 
 pride. Besides, they will complete their educa- 
 tion in a way that no university could, and, 
 after it is over, no one will be able to accuse 
 us justly again of being " a race of provincials." 
 
 1 felt that I had to say this quickly, as judging 
 by the letters I got to-day the Americans have 
 given Paris a shock, and the material is too 
 good to be long neglected by the space writers. 
 So -don't worry. It is unimportant. 
 
 I have another brood of chickens — this time 
 twelve out of thirteen — and yet Amelie is not 
 content. I hope the next will be really satisfying, 
 — expect them in a few days. 
 
 I don't need to tell you that I was very 
 popular here on the Fourth. Every one treated 
 me as if I were the entire United States of 
 America. After long years of doubting, it was 
 a fine feeling. I felt all warm and comfy about 
 my heart. I had waited so long for it. 
 
 47
 
 VI 
 
 July 27, 191 7 
 
 I was surprised on looking in my letter-book 
 to find that it is already three weeks since I 
 last wrote to you. But a farmer's life is a busy 
 one, and we have had strange weather — so 
 changeable. The seventh and eighth were hot 
 and muggy, the ninth like a chilly autumn day, 
 the twelfth and thirteenth were very hot ; on 
 the seventeenth we had a rainstorm that turned 
 my garden into a lake, and the road into a brook. 
 Then came one awfully hot day— just scorching 
   — and since then it has been beautiful. All this 
 has been good for our crops. I've had peas 
 and beans, cucumbers and tomatoes, strawberries 
 and raspberries — in fact, I think every day, as I 
 sit down at noon, that I live just as well now 
 as I could at any crack restaurant in the world. 
 Next week I shall have green corn and all sorts 
 of other dainties. It is a pity that it is not 
 summer every day in the year. 
 
 On the tenth I saw the first camions full of 
 Americans going over the road towards Meaux. 
 As I sat in the little cart watching them go by, 
 I did wish I could tell them that I was an Ameri- 
 can, but it seemed best not to. They are — 
 
 48
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 for prudential reasons — advised not to talk to 
 strangers, and it is wise. So I contented myself 
 with smiling at them — every one does that — 
 and feeling a bit chagrined that they did not 
 recognize in me a fellow-citizen. 
 
 All the commune has been busy for a fortnight 
 picking cassis — the black currants — and the Eng- 
 lish are going to risk buying them to make jelly 
 for the soldiers. It is always one of the prettiest 
 times of the year, when little children as well as 
 men and women are sitting on low stools under 
 the laden bushes, in the hot sun and the showers. 
 But it is weary work, and they look so tired, as 
 at four o'clock they rest for a bite and lie sprawled 
 everywhere to eat their bread and cheese. 
 
 We have had some trying days, days when 
 leading a normal life seemed absurd. On the 
 seventeenth the bombardment was so heavy that 
 the very house shook, and the twenty-first was 
 no better. Yet the newspapers gave no news 
 that would seem to explain in either case. It 
 simply recalls to our minds that it is going on 
 always — this war. 
 
 Last night was a hard one. I was reading 
 in bed, and, for lack of anything new, I had 
 taken up Benson's Lord of the World — more 
 interesting now than when I first read it. 
 Suddenly 1 was literally made to jump out of 
 bed by a terrible explosion — not in the direction 
 of the front. I went into the back of the house 
 and looked out towards Paris. It was a black 
 night — no moon, no stars — and deathly still. 
 1 was finally almost convinced that it was a 
 
 E 49
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 terrible and solitary clap of thunder. So I 
 went back to bed. 
 
 Half an hour later came a series of terrific 
 explosions. So I wrapped up and went out into 
 the orchard. 
 
 . I could see the light of a fire in the east, but 
 not in the direction of Paris, and much nearer. 
 By this time I heard voices everywhere and knew 
 that other people were up. There was no doubt 
 what it was, of course — ammunition works. The 
 morning papers announce the hand-grenade factory 
 at Claye destroyed. Pity ! We need all our 
 ammunition. 
 
 Of course that meant no sleep for me. Once 
 I am waked up well, no hope of sleeping again 
 these days. 
 
 I am amused at your letter about Jeannette. 
 Glad you enjoyed her, but rather sorry you ask 
 for news of her. Alas ! her news is not good. 
 But here it is. Jeannette could never be cured 
 of the habits of her youth — for which she was 
 not to blame — nor be reconciled to lack, of liberty. 
 As long as she remained, she continued to b-l-lart 
 in the most heartrending manner if she was left 
 alone. Amelie had something to do besides 
 sitting with her, and I grew weary, if ever I sent 
 Amelie on an errand in the afternoon, of either 
 listening to her heartbreaking calls, or taking a 
 book and a camp chair and bearing her company. 
 When we did not go to her, she cried and would 
 not eat. So pretty soon she went dry — then — 
 she went away, too. I hope she found Pierre and 
 Paul in the Happy Hunting Grounds. 
 
 50 '
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 It was a pretty sore subject for some time. But 
 one gets used to everything, and the other day 
 I asked Amelie how much she got for Pierre and 
 Paul. " Eighteen francs," she replied. Then I 
 made a heartless calculation. " We paid twelve 
 for Jeannette. We sold the whole outfit for 
 thirty-five. We were twenty-three francs to the 
 good plus experience, a few quarts of milk, and 
 some fun." 
 
 I should not have diverted you with details 
 like that. You brought it on yourself. 
 
 These bucolic diversions do not help us to 
 forget — nothing can ; but they sometimes ease the 
 strain wonderfully. 
 
 Incidentally — I saw a soldier from one of the 
 ambulance corps the other day, who was at Arras 
 when the battle ended after a month of pretty 
 stiff fighting. He tells me it is a dead city. It 
 was bombarded in the early days of 19 14. It 
 was bombarded in July, 191 5, and now, through 
 the month of May, the battle raged round it. It 
 was a beautiful and historic city — full of wonder- 
 ful old buildings. It is now a ruin. But as the 
 stretcher-bearer said : " Talk about beauty ! I 
 stood in the Petite Place, in the moonlight, one 
 night, looking toward the once majestic Hotel de 
 Ville above whose arch-supported Gothic facade 
 soared, in October, 19 14, that lofty belfry. All 
 about me was ruin, and through the broken 
 facade and falling tower the white moonlight 
 streamed, making one of the most wonderful 
 pictures I had ever seen. It was the very majesty 
 and dignity of desolation. No centuries-old 
 
 51
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Greek or Egyptian or Roman ruin ever moved 
 me more deeply. I have been often in the moon- 
 light to look at the Coliseum at Rome, and I 
 could not help wishing that before that ruin is 
 restored all the world might see it as I saw it 
 that night. Its dignity, its desolation, and its 
 beauty seemed to me so symbolic of France of 
 to-day." 
 
 52
 
 VII 
 
 August 14, 191 7 
 
 Sorry to tell you that the weather turned 
 nasty in the last days of July. The leaves began 
 to turn brown, to dry, and to fall. The world 
 already looks like autumn. It fills me with mis- 
 givings for the winter. I have been putting in 
 wood, in the hope of having something I can call 
 a fire. I have been buying wood wherever I 
 could get it. It is slow work, the wood is queer 
 stuff — what the trade calls benefice des boncher- 
 ons — that is to say, gnarled pieces, roots, big 
 chunks, in fact all the wood not considered good 
 enough for a respectable woodpile, and which 
 dealers do not buy. Needless to say that I pay 
 just as much for it as if it were the neat three- 
 feet-long logs my fire-place demands. 
 
 There is no coal in sight. 
 
 However, it is not yet winter. It is indeed 
 two months before, under usual climatic con- 
 ditions, 1 should think of needing fires. Yet, 
 even to-day I could enjoy a brisk fire in the 
 evenings, which are more like October than 
 August. 
 
 Don't imagine that I am depressed. I am not. 
 I am simply, by force of habit, telling you the 
 truth. 
 
 53
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 I wonder if a full realization of the situation 
 over here will ever come to you in the States. I 
 don't yet see how it can. The ocean is wide. 
 I know myself how difficult it is to arrive at an 
 actual conception of a far-off disaster. But I 
 suppose that, next year, when every day's news- 
 paper will carry its list of casualties, you will feel 
 quite differently from what you do now, and have 
 less taste for the sight of marching regiments and 
 bands of music. 
 
 Just imagine what France is like to-day. The 
 north-east is a devastated battle-field. The rest 
 of the country is spread pretty thick with factories 
 making war materials. The fields on which we 
 are depending to live are being cultivated, short- 
 handed, as best they can be, by women, children, 
 old men, and war prisoners. The south and 
 west are overcrowded with training camps, cantines^ 
 hospitals and refugees. It is an inconceivable 
 situation. One has to see it to realize it. When 
 one thinks of it seriously, isn't it remarkable to 
 see how, with the entire able-bodied male popula- 
 tion in the war, the work of the nation can go on 
 at all ? It is not astonishing that we lack things. 
 It is miraculous that we get on at all, and that, 
 once the army is fed, there is anything left for us 
 civilians. 
 
 Of course we are not just now seeing anything 
 of the war except in our little ambulance — where 
 to-day they are mostly sick and convalescents — 
 usually boys slowly coming back to interest in 
 life from having been gassed. Our roads are 
 quiet. We rarely hear more than a dull far-off 
 
 54
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 booming of guns. It often sounds about as much 
 like horses kicking in their stalls as anything else. 
 
 To be sure we only have to cross the Marne 
 into Meaux to get a different impression. For 
 Meaux is a military centre, and always was. Its 
 huge barracks near the cathedral gave it, even in 
 peace time, a military aspect. There is to-day 
 a big military hospital in the barracks, which are 
 built quite round the great sunlit inner court, and 
 cover an immense tract of ground. In the 
 barracks there is to-day one of the hundreds of 
 English cantines that the British are running for 
 the French soldiers. It is conducted by a group 
 of British ladies, one of them a cousin of Lord 
 French, a lady older than I am, who works with 
 all the enthusiasm of a girl, and with the tact and 
 ability that girls lack. 
 
 These wonderful British women are among the 
 most interesting things the war has brought to 
 France. The leaders are often women — wives 
 and widows of officers — who have seen Indian 
 service. You know the type of horseback-riding 
 women, used to adventure and danger, with pluck 
 as well as charm, slender, nervous, and untiring. 
 
 Their cantine at Meaux is a model one. It 
 serves special regimes for six hundred soldiers, 
 provides reading matter, teaches them sports, 
 takes an interest in them when they go back to 
 the front, and keeps them furnished with all sorts 
 of comforts. 
 
 I wish that you, who have such respect for 
 order — you know you always were tiresomely or- 
 derly — could see that huge kitchen, all freshly 
 
 55
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 painted pale green, with its wide door opening 
 into the big sunlit court, where the soldiers sit 
 about, the horses are exercised, huge army 
 camions are lined up, and at the far end of which 
 are the neat freshly built sheds for the German 
 prisoners. 
 
 There is a range across the back, and near the 
 open door there is a reading-table on which there 
 are always fresh flowers and groups of rattan 
 chairs stand around it. At one side is a tiny 
 dining-room, where the directress of the cantine 
 and her aides eat, and behind it a room with two 
 stoves where they make gallons and gallons of tea 
 and coffee in the biggest urns I ever saw. 
 
 The service is no glorious one, I can tell you. 
 There is nothing picturesque about it. It is sheer 
 hard work — at times it is almost menial. I am 
 telling you about it, because I want you to realize 
 what war is demanding of women to-day. 
 
 Every day one of these women gets an order 
 from the head nurse for a certain number of soups, 
 a certain number of meat dishes, so many dishes 
 of specified vegetables, etc. This list is written 
 on a big blackboard fixed on the wall beside the 
 stove, and at a certain hour the men who dis- 
 tribute the food come to the kitchen to carry away 
 the trays. Often the only help they have is from 
 the convalescent soldiers and German prisoners. 
 They stand over the hot stoves themselves, 
 unmindful of complexion or hands. 
 
 Whenever I was there I always felt a great 
 curiosity regarding the mental processes of the 
 Germans. I watched their quick way of working, 
 
 56
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 their silence, their docility, and, as far as I could 
 see, perfect politeness. I got the idea in my head 
 that no matter what they might say, there was 
 not one of them, judging by their looks, who did 
 not rejoice that for him, and probably through no 
 fault of his, the horrors of war were over. I 
 knew that one at least of the English ladies spoke 
 German. So I asked her one day about them. 
 She replied — 
 
 " They are the best, the most civil, the best 
 disciplined help we have ever had. They are 
 clean about their work, and absolutely obedient. 
 There is never any question about an order. 
 It is given. It is executed." 
 
 That did not surprise me, but that was not what 
 I wanted to know. So I put the question flatly, 
 " But about the war ? Do they still believe in a 
 victory for Germany ? " 
 
 " Oh, absolutely," she replied. " They have 
 no doubt about that. They say quite freely that 
 they can easily hold out three years longer ; that 
 we may hold them, but we cannot beat them. 
 There are no two minds amongst them on that 
 subject. They even agree so well in their manner 
 of insisting that it almost seems as if they were 
 speaking under orders." 
 
 I give you this for what it is worth, only insist- 
 ing, since you so often ' write as if you in the 
 States had the idea that we were soon to see 
 Germany break. I often wonder where you get 
 the idea. Here it looks to us every year as if 
 Germany were stronger, instead of weaker ; as if 
 each year, with her capacity for obedience and her 
 
 57
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 habits of organization, she was learning in the war 
 new ways of safeguarding herself. We never can 
 get away from that forty years of preparation, for 
 while we are working so hard to recover from 
 years of foolish idleness, Germany is no more idle 
 than we are. I have said this to you more than 
 once, I am afraid, and if I keep insisting it is only 
 because it seems to me a fatal error to ignore that 
 fact. 
 
 These ladies at Meaux, who have never before 
 known long hours of manual labour, great respon- 
 sibility, and absolute negation of personal tastes, 
 have nevertheless started to arrange a night 
 can tine at Meaux. 
 
 I may have told you before that Meaux is 
 strangely lacking in restaurants. In spite of its 
 historical interest, it is not so much visited as 
 many other towns less famous. There is no 
 restaurant of any sort in the station. There is a 
 common buvette at one end where workmen go 
 to get a drink, but where no other class would 
 dream of entering. There is a terrace outside, 
 where one can sit down to drink a lemonade. It is 
 just the most ordinary buvette, with a zinc counter 
 in front of a sink for washing glasses ; and there 
 is always a crowd — and a very smelly one — in front 
 of it. There are few hotels, only one fairly good, 
 but they are in the town, at some distance from, 
 the railway station. 
 
 Of course Meaux is a great military centre 
 now. Through its big station pass all the trains 
 from the front from Verdun to the north which 
 do not pass over the northern road to Belgium. 
 
 58
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Military trains are slow. Hundreds of men from 
 the huge camp of permissionaires at Vaires have to 
 change cars, both coming in and going out, at 
 Meaux, and often they wait hours to make their 
 connection. This wait is more often than not in 
 the night. It is bitter cold on the long covered 
 platform, and there is no chance to get even a cup 
 of coffee. 
 
 So these English ladies are setting up a night 
 cantine there, to be running from midnight to 
 four o'clock, and half the little group is to be on 
 duty every night, ready to serve hot tea, coffee, 
 or soup. 
 
 I often laugh when I see them, over the fuss 
 that has been made in my time over the " eight- 
 hour law " for able-bodied men. Of course I 
 know that you are going to fling back at me 
 that women are tougher than men, even harking 
 back that boy babies are harder to bring through 
 childhood than girls. But that has nothing to 
 do with the question. The real thing is, that if 
 only the world in its development could aid 
 people to find work to do that they either loved 
 or believed in, their hours of labour would not 
 be the hated slavery they now are to the mass. 
 
 I hope you won't mind my talking so much 
 about the women in this war. I wish you could 
 come over here if only to see them. I feel that 
 there has been nothing more worth while done in 
 the war than the work of women of all nations. 
 I know you women in the States are all working, 
 but to realize what is being done, one has to see 
 it over here. 
 
 59
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 I imagine we have buried for all time what 
 has for so many years been known as the " woman 
 question." It has been a long and bitter struggle, 
 and so often conducted on unwise lines. It 
 requires a fanatic to lead a crusade, and the 
 woman cause has had its fanatics — and its martyrs 
 too. The beauty of the whole matter is that 
 woman has won by acts, not words. She has won 
 by doing a woman's work. Best of all she has, 
 for all time, given the lie to the argument that 
 she had no right to the franchise because in case 
 of a war she could not protect her country. It 
 has taken a war to prove the falseness of such an 
 argument, and to demonstrate that, while women 
 could not, as a sex, carry a rifle into battle, there 
 was work just as important — real war work — 
 which she could do, and she has done it well, in 
 a manner which has compelled man to bare his 
 head before her, and bend his knee to her just 
 as devoutly as he ever did in the days of chivalry, 
 even while he recognized in her a comrade and 
 an equal. 
 
 Moreover, when she was needed and capable, 
 she has actually gone into the firing line, and won 
 and worn her decoration for the same reasons 
 that men have received them. 
 
 In every branch of war work done by unarmed 
 men, women have appeared and shown the same 
 courage and the same unfailing patriotism as 
 men. They have worked for the cause and died 
 for it without in any way unsexing themselves. 
 I have seen thousands of these women, and I give 
 you my word that among no women I have ever 
 
 60
 
 • THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 met in my long life have I found " womanliness ' 
 finer than among the women near the front, every 
 one of whom was doing work that but for them 
 an able-bodied man would have had to stay behind 
 the fighting-line to do. 
 
 I hope you have heard about the English 
 Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, made absolutely 
 imperative by the need of more men before the 
 States came in. These are young women of all 
 classes, enlisted like men for the duration of the 
 war, dressed in khaki, living in camps or cantonne- 
 menls just like the men, under exactly the same 
 conditions as the Tommies, and facetiously called 
 by their friends " Waacs." The big force of 
 thousands is officered by women. They live 
 behind the lines under the same conditions as the 
 men, and do all sorts of clerical work — post-office, 
 telegraph, motor-cycle — in fact, everything a 
 woman can do to liberate a man to carry a 
 rifle. 
 
 I have a number of young girl friends in the 
 corps, dressed in uniform, wearing military boots, 
 living a soldier's life of hardship and discipline. 
 No wonder the suffrage excitement is already 
 ancient history. If war does nothing but this 
 for Great Britain, it has done much. Yet we 
 who are looking on know already that this is only 
 one of the great things it has achieved. 
 
 This is getting to be a long letter. Never 
 mind. When things are slow, as they are now, 
 and 1 am so shut away that I have no one to 
 whom I can chatter, no one to theorize with, I 
 have to clear my brain now and then by talking 
 
 61
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 to a sheet of paper — just to drive the haze and 
 confusion out of my mind. 
 
 Useless to talk to you across the ocean about 
 the ever-changing and day after day more 
 threatening Russian situation. I am afraid nothing 
 can now stop the fatal trend of events. For the 
 time — and ' perhaps for ever — we are evidently 
 going to lose Russia. I wonder if you in the 
 States have the faintest idea what this means ? 
 Why, if Germany succeeds in getting Russia 
 disarmed in the next few months — well, I dare 
 not even say to myself all that it seems to me to 
 threaten. Poor Russian people — such dreamers ! 
 They are not wicked. I do not believe that they 
 have the faintest conception of the disaster they 
 are preparing for France. Of course Germany 
 does not yet believe that the States can put any 
 important fighting force into France before she 
 fetches off the coup which will liberate a couple of 
 millions of soldiers now on her eastern frontiers 
 to march against us. It is a formidable idea for 
 us to face. Well, England put a fighting army 
 into France in eight months, and had to bring a 
 large part of it from Canada and Australia. And, 
 alas ! in addition to the hordes that may come to 
 fling themselves en masse on us before the States 
 are ready, you must not forget that the middle- 
 Europe powers can put nearly a million fresh 
 troops into the field automatically, each year, from 
 the classes which reach military age — they are 
 prolific, those Boche races. 
 
 Then, also, no means are too low for them. 
 When a country is without honour and without 
 
 62
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 shame, its means of increasing savage purposes 
 is tremendously increased. When the true 
 history of the Russian debacle is written, it will 
 add another startling page to the deathless dis- 
 honour of Prussianized Germany. If one stops 
 at nothing, one can, temporarily, accomplish many 
 things. I am sure the untiring American war 
 correspondent must have already told you of one 
 of the methods by which the Germans get some 
 of the Russians to lay down their arms. How, 
 having, for days, bombarded a discouraged army, 
 cut them off from their reinforcements and their 
 commissary trains by a heavy artillery barrage, 
 reduced by hunger, thirst and panic, they sent 
 out a flag of truce accompanied by wheelbarrows 
 full of a special kind of bread of which the 
 Russians are fond, and vodka of which they have 
 been deprived since the first year of the war. 
 They fed and inebriated them when their hope 
 and power of resistance was at its lowest ebb. 
 Of course, that is not a very encouraging sign for 
 the Russian race, but after all, as a people they 
 are only children ; not warriors, but mystics and 
 dreamers, and know nothing of international 
 affairs. They have never known responsibility, 
 so how can they know honour ? 
 
 It is a tragic situation for us. But we must be 
 patient with them, even in our dread of the 
 consequences. It is that, or throwing that huge, 
 rich undeveloped country — which in the future is 
 likely to be the El Dorado of adventurers, and 
 see a stampede which will surpass California, or 
 Kimberley, or the Klondike — into the greedy 
 
 6 3
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 hands of Germany. If we cannot prevent that 
 at any sacrifice, I do not see how Europe — or the 
 rest of the world for that matter — is going to 
 escape from the domination of Germany except 
 after centuries of war. Germany seems able to 
 fight, and organize and commercially invade, at 
 the same time. 
 
 This is why I cannot look forward without 
 shuddering. Germany expects to settle with 
 Russia in the next six months. Can the States 
 be ready then ? 
 
 Don't imagine 1 am downhearted. I am not. 
 But I tell you quite frankly, I am terribly nervous, 
 and the calm about here just now does not make 
 me less so. 1 am sure that there is not an 
 intelligent person, here who does not know what 
 the result of this struggle is to be, but it is the 
 realization — every month more clear — of all it is 
 going to cost which keeps our nerves a bit 
 over-strung. 
 
 6 4
 
 VIII 
 
 August 24, 1 91 7 
 
 I have had quite an active month, for me. 
 
 I have been visiting and I have had company 
 twice. Rather exciting, isn't it ? Otherwise my 
 life has been as usual : — a little work in the 
 garden, a weekly visit to the ambulance, and now 
 and then a call from some of the convalescent 
 soldiers. 
 
 My sweet corn came up wonderfully. I have 
 been eating it almost every day. But you should 
 see my French neighbours' surprise at the deed. 
 They raise fodder corn for their cattle. They 
 never heard of such a thing as eating any kind of 
 corn. Whenever they pass the garden while I am 
 gathering it, they always stop to watch me, and 
 when I come down the bank swinging the bunch 
 of ears in my hand, they invariably ask, " What is 
 Madame going to do with it ? " 
 
 " Eat it," I reply, opening the husks to show 
 the golden kernels. 
 
 " Pas possible ! ' ' is the inevitable exclamation. 
 
 You see, if there is one thing which it is im- 
 possible to do, it is to change the habits of these 
 people. I have cooked the corn, and shown them 
 how to eat it. Not they ! They spit it out. I 
 have induced them to eat corn-bread, but only 
 f 65
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 when it is made with eggs and milk, and sweetened. 
 They call it " cake," and eat it with relish, but 
 corn-meal mush, hasty pudding, and things of 
 that sort, which would relieve the bread question, 
 I have thus far found impossible for them. 
 
 Absolutely nothing happens here. After three 
 years of war almost every day has become an 
 anniversary day. The other years it was not so 
 marked — this tendency to look back — but since 
 we entered the fourth year, it seems as though 
 every one had the same idea. It is constantly, 
 "three years ago to-day" such and such a thing 
 happened. First it was Liege which was on every 
 one's tongue. Then it was Mons, and so on 
 down the memories of that opening month of 
 war. We are already prepared to celebrate, at 
 the Cathedral at Meaux, and by a pious pilgrimage 
 to the graves on the plain, the third anniversary 
 of the victory of the Marne, a victory which seems 
 to gain in importance each year, and which marked 
 the end of the open field battles and inaugurated 
 the trying trench warfare. Even when the war is 
 over, I imagine there will have been nothing to 
 dim the importance of this battle. 
 
 In the meantime the weather is annoying, and 
 we have to support it with what patience we can, 
 and try our best not to dread the winter. It is 
 like late autumn already. I should so love a 
 blazing fire in the evening. As it is impossible, I 
 go into my cosy bed early and read. 
 
 We watch, as well as the reticence of our little 
 newspapers will let us, the terribly slow and costly 
 gnawing into the German lines — it looks about an 
 
 66
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 inch a day — of the French north of Verdun, and 
 the English east of Ypres. Now and then we get 
 a thrilling story from some point on the line, like 
 that of the taking of Cote 70 by the Canadians 
 on the 15th, which nearly accomplished the 
 encircling of Lens. 
 
 Quiet as we are here, we live under the obses- 
 sion of the thing going on " out there," knowing 
 that every hour is marked by its acts of personal 
 heroism in a struggle so gigantic that the individual 
 no longer counts, and acts of bravery are only 
 valuable as giving tone and colour to the entire 
 Allied effort in a war where Man has simply 
 surpassed himself. 
 
 I do hope that you are reading John Buchan's 
 " History of the War." Tt will help you to 
 understand many things about which I have not 
 been able to write you. It is not, of course, the 
 final word. Where so much is concealed, the 
 final word cannot be said until much later. But 
 it is a sane and a calm effort, and it helps one 
 wonderfully. 
 
 I refuse the bait your last letter holds out. As 
 long as I can resist it, I will not talk about the 
 political situation. For over a hundred and fifty 
 years we have made a sort of fetich of what we 
 call " the people." Well, the justice of that idea 
 is on trial now, and while I consider that what 
 looks disastrous at present is really in the logical 
 march of development, I confess that the situation 
 is grave. Any effort to curb the movement now 
 would be a direct attack on liberty — liberty of 
 speech, liberty of opinion. In the advance of the 
 
 67
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 world " there is no backward step, no returning," 
 though sometimes ideas that have served their 
 purpose do get sloughed off, and progress goes 
 on without them. 
 
 The pitiful thing about this war is — I suppose 
 it is true of all wars for an idea — that the bravest 
 and worthiest have died — the cream of the younger 
 cultured class, the best of the youth from the 
 farming districts and fishing stations of Brittany. 
 The cultivator has always been the backbone of 
 France. The working-man has always been the 
 agitator. The young farmers are all in the fight- 
 ing regiments. The workmen are in the factories 
 and on the railroads, and it is the latter class which 
 predominates in the Socialists, and has a taste for 
 being " ag'in the government." The farmers are 
 filling soldiers' graves, along with the students and 
 the aristocracy. The working-man is filling his 
 pockets and talking. It is a new proof — if one 
 were needed — of the vitality of France, the home 
 of real liberty, where it is difficult to muzzle 
 any one, that things are not worse than you choose 
 to think them. Let that satisfy you. It has to 
 satisfy us. Besides, if you will find any war, in 
 any country, and in any century, in which some 
 one did not get rich, from the days of conquest, 
 even before the great William of Normandy, down 
 to wars for an idea, like our own Civil War, I 
 should dearly love to hear about it. 
 
 Well, my one English-speaking friend, who 
 lives over the hill on the other side of the Grande 
 Morin, is preparing again to return to the States. 
 You may remember that she left here before the 
 
 68
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 battle of the Marne, and returned, to my great joy, 
 the following summer. She has a little daughter, 
 and this is no place for a child who can be taken 
 out of such an atmosphere. It leaves me less 
 isolated, in a certain sense, than I was in 19 14, 
 for, in three years, my French neighbours have all 
 been drawn closer around me by our common 
 interests and common troubles. Be sure that 1 
 am not, and never have been at all, lonely, even 
 though I am now and then nervous, as who is 
 not ? Your letters do not give the impression 
 that you are absolutely calm. 
 
 69
 
 IX 
 
 September 4, 191 7 
 
 Since 1 last wrote, I have been travelling. I 
 have been to Versailles for a week-end. I can 
 hear you laughing. Well, I assure you that it 
 was no laughing matter. The days have gone by 
 when we used to just run out to Versailles for 
 a few hours in the afternoon. It took me five 
 hours and a half from my door to my destination, 
 just at the entrance of the park, by the Grille de 
 Neptune. It was a real voyage, and the first one 
 I have made, — if you except those to Paris, — 
 since the war broke out. 
 
 I went up to Paris by the five o'clock train, to 
 escape the heat of midday. That train, which is 
 the only one we have in these days which is not 
 strictly a stopping-train, only makes two stops 
 between Esbly, where I change to the main line, 
 and Paris, instead of the seven the other trains 
 make, and I expected, at the latest, to be in Paris 
 by half-past six, with just time to get a bite, and 
 take the twenty-five minutes past seven train for 
 Versailles, and get there by half-past eight, before 
 dark. No one likes to travel after dark if it can 
 be avoided — dark trains, dimly lighted stations, 
 no porters, and few cabs, you know. 
 
 70
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 From the beginning all my plans miscarried. 
 The train to Paris stopped and was side-tracked 
 three times. Once we waited fifteen minutes, so 
 that it was half-past seven when I arrived, and 
 I missed my train for Versailles, and had to 
 wait until nearly nine o'clock. There were not 
 half a dozen passengers in the train, and it was 
 already nearly dark when it pulled out. The 
 familiar little hour's ride was as strange as though 
 I had never made it. The train stopped every- 
 where. All the stations were dark as possible, 
 and therefore unrecognizable. It was a queer 
 sensation to run along beside a platform in the 
 still early darkness, see a door open from the 
 ticket office, a woman, with a mobilization band 
 round her left arm and a small cap on her head, 
 come out in the narrow stream of light from the 
 half-opened door, and stand ready, while perhaps 
 one person got out and no one got in, to blow 
 her little whistle for the train to go ahead, while 
 I strained my eyes to catch somewhere the name 
 of the station, and never once did it. 
 
 If any one had told me that anything so 
 familiar could be so unfamiliar I would not have 
 believed it. 
 
 The result was that instead of getting to 
 Versailles at half- past eight, when I was expected, 
 I got there at ten. There was no way of sending 
 word — no telephonic communication is possible, 
 and telegrams take often forty-eight hours for the 
 shortest distances. 
 
 At Versailles the porter was a quarter of an 
 hour finding a cab, so I arrived at my destination, 
 
 7*
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 a strange house, whose noble staircase was pitch- 
 dark — and I had no electric lamp in my pocket — 
 the concierge in bed, and very cross at being 
 wakened, and I groped my way in the strange 
 house up three flights of stairs to find my hostess 
 lying awake and worrying. You see there is one 
 thing to be said for these war times, — the very 
 smallest effort one makes becomes an exciting 
 adventure — else what would I have to write 
 you about ? 
 
 I never saw Versailles more beautiful. 
 
 The house in which I visited had a balcony 
 overlooking the bassin de Neptune. The situation 
 was ideal, not only for its beautiful outlook and 
 its wonderful afternoon lights, but because of 
 the ease with which one could, in five minutes, 
 walk up to the top of that glorious terrace, on the 
 park side of the palace, and look down that superb 
 vista over the tapis vert to the glistening canal 
 beyond, and also because I could sit on a balcony 
 overlooking the street and that part of the 
 park, and enjoy such a picturesque and changing 
 scene as the Versailles of our days has never 
 known. 
 
 The town was full of training camps, cantonne- 
 ments y and cantines. Soldiers of all nations, all 
 colours, all divisions, and all grades pass in and 
 out the park gates all day. The Tower of Babel 
 could have been nothing to what the park of 
 Versailles was that Sunday that I was there. 
 There were Americans and British, — Canadians, 
 Australians, Egyptians, Indians, — there were 
 
 72
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 French and Senegalese and Moroccans ; there 
 were Serbs and Italians ; there were Portuguese 
 and Belgians and Rastas, and alas ! there were a 
 few Russians, for there are millions of them just 
 as ashamed of what is happening out in the east 
 as we are, and just as sad over it. There were 
 blacks and whites, yellows and reds and browns. 
 There were chic officers, some of them on leave, 
 still sporting their pantalons rouges, and much- 
 braided kipis. There were slouching poilus in 
 their baggy trousers and ill-fitting coats, and 
 smart English Tommies, and broad-hatted Yanks, 
 looking as if they wished they could go coatless 
 and roll up their sleeves — it was a hot day — 
 instantly distinguishable from the wide-hatted 
 Australians and Canadians. Nothing was hand- 
 somer than the Italians with their smart, half-high 
 hats, or more amusing than the Belgians' little 
 tassels of all colours jigging from the front of 
 their head-covering. All day that picturesque 
 crowd passed in and out of the park, with crowds 
 of women and children and all sorts of civilians. 
 
 Just opposite the balcony where we sat was a 
 shop where they sold all sorts of souvenirs of the 
 town — and post-cards. From morning till night 
 the crowd stopped there, and it seemed to me 
 that pictures of Versailles must be going over the 
 world, and surely to many places that had never 
 heard of it before. I could not help thinking of 
 the beginnings of culture that all these people 
 must be unconsciously taking in at the pores, — at 
 least I hoped they were. Many of the boys from 
 
 73
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 the States, who in the ordinary course of normal 
 life could never have hoped to see the place, and 
 who are able to appreciate it and love it, will at 
 least have that much to the good — among many- 
 other things — when they go home. 
 
 Of course the palace is hermetically closed. It 
 has to be. All the same, I did wish that some of 
 the American boys, who had never crossed the 
 big pond before, could have seen it. However, 
 for actual eye satisfaction the outside of the big 
 palace and its parks is more important. I only 
 regretted the interior because I longed for them 
 to have it all. 
 
 It was wonderful how gay the crowd was, and 
 how well the soldiers behaved, and how interested 
 they all were in the children. The interest 
 seemed mutual. I'll warrant there is not a child 
 in Versailles who does not know every uniform on 
 sight, or who does not recognize every nationality 
 and every grade. 
 
 I only saw our boys at a distance as they came 
 and went. But my hostess, who is living in 
 Versailles for the summer and autumn, not only 
 meets and talks with them on days when the park 
 is not so thronged as it is on Sundays, she has 
 them sitting by her fireside to drink tea. She 
 tells me that some of them are terribly homesick. 
 They miss their women-folks, and their young 
 girl friends. That is perfectly natural, for the 
 comradeship between young men and women in 
 the States is a sort of relation which no other 
 people have or understand. Even homesickness 
 
 74
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 which will be forgotten as soon as they are actively 
 " in it " is, I am told, doing them good. It may 
 console all of you on the other side of the water 
 to know that the boys speak of " home ' as 
 probably none of you ever heard them speak, and 
 say " mother " in a tone quite new to them. So 
 there is gain in all things. 
 
 I did not care to go into the park in the crowd. 
 It was much more interesting to watch the moving 
 throng from my high gallery seat, and to wander 
 about the park in the early morning, when it was 
 practically empty. That is a chance one rarely 
 gets unless one is staying there. You have no 
 idea how lovely it looks then, and one can wander 
 at will, and every turn is a new picture, all the 
 more beautiful for lacking fellow-creatures in 
 modern clothes. I never see it, as I saw it one 
 breezy morning, when there seemed to be only us 
 two about, without feeling a debt of gratitude to 
 Louis XIV, great builder that he was. It is a 
 debt that accumulates. Even Republican France 
 can afford to be grateful to him, and forgive his 
 faults for the sake of the grandeur he conferred 
 on them, and which no republic can ever dare to 
 imitate out of the country's purse. 
 
 I wish you, who know the park so well, could 
 see it this year. There are no flowers. Some 
 of the pines and cedars on the terraces are neg- 
 lected — the number of gardeners is insufficient 
 for all the work — and in some of the more 
 primitive parts of the park the trees need trim- 
 ming. Instead of flowers there are vegetables 
 
 75
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 planted everywhere. All the flower beds sur- 
 rounding the grass plots are planted with potatoes 
 and beans and simple garden stuff". As the 
 French gardener is incapable of doing anything 
 ugly, these beds of vegetables are laid out just 
 as carefully as if the choicest flowers from the 
 serres were there ; each bed has its label, carefully 
 placed, to indicate the variety, bearing the words, 
 " Planted for Ambulance No. — — ." Isn't that 
 a pretty idea ? 
 
 Several of the fountains were being repaired 
 the morning we walked there alone, and one of 
 them was playing, just as if for us. It was de- 
 lightful to be walking along a shady alley, with 
 the thick carpet of dry leaves rustling underfoot, 
 and stirring all one's memories of the historic 
 days of the ancient regime, and to see suddenly 
 at the end of the vista a jet of water rise into 
 the air, and the autumn breeze shake it into 
 spray. Ordinarily on days when such a sight 
 is possible, a great crowd prevents one from 
 realizing that it is beautiful as well as spectacular, 
 and the same crowd and its movement drives 
 away the spectres of the past. 
 
 It was lucky 1 made this brief visit. If I had 
 not, 1 don't know what I could have written to 
 you about. It is the same old story of patient 
 waiting, — of trying realization that we are all 
 used to of the slow movement and the meagre 
 results. The Allies are holding the beast by 
 the throat out there, and it begins to look as 
 if that were about all that could be done until 
 the boys from the States are ready to go in 
 
 7 6
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 and choke him. After all, it is a pretty big 
 job — and the beast dies hard. I am afraid he 
 does not yet realize that he is being choked. All 
 I pray is that he does not get away, and make 
 another bound. Not that it will matter except 
 to make us all mad. 
 
 77
 
 X 
 
 October 4, 191 7 
 
 September was not a bad month, except that 
 it led us nearer to the winter, which I frankly 
 dread. In two weeks it will be time to light 
 up the fires, not for the cheer to my eyes, but 
 from actual necessity — and I've no fuel. 
 
 Already the garden is faded. The only things 
 still flowering are a few brave roses, zinnias, and 
 Indian pinks. Everything else has been either 
 cut back or taken up. 
 
 I have done nothing this month — except the 
 usual thing, studying a map of the front, or 
 wondering at what date Germany will choose 
 to fling the concentrated forces the Russian 
 dibdcle put at her disposal against us. You 
 seem to have not the smallest idea of this possi- 
 bility, since I note in your last letter your remark 
 " that Germany is in a shocking state, and must 
 break soon." I wonder where you get that im- 
 pression, and wait for the moment, sure to come, 
 when your eyes will be opened to the truth — 
 that time serves Germany as well as it serves 
 us ; that if we were stronger to-day than we were 
 in 1 9 14, so is she ; and that not until the States 
 can actually put fighting men into the line is 
 
 78
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 there any hope of our doing more than we have 
 done so far — hold the Boche. 
 
 Please God the time does not come when 
 we cannot. 
 
 Since I last wrote you I have made two trips 
 across the Marne to Juilly, to visit the American 
 hospital. Many of the nurses over there have 
 been very neighbourly since, nearly two years 
 ago, after the first offensive in Champagne, two 
 of them led Colonel Pelletier over here one 
 dreary rainy day to call. He is General Pelletier 
 to-day. He gave his right arm to his country 
 in that autumn fight of 191 5, and you may know 
 him by name in the States, as he was the first 
 man to greet General Pershing when he landed 
 in France. He speaks English as well as we do, 
 — the case with so many colonial officers. Ever 
 since that afternoon I have had a sort of sentiment 
 for Juilly. The nurses and doctors have been 
 rather neighbourly, but I have never got up the 
 energy to return their nice visits. I liked the 
 idea, that, not far away, men and women of my 
 race were working for France, at a place that 
 I could almost see from my lawn. I can actually, 
 on a clear day, see Monge, the last town passed 
 on the road to Juilly. 
 
 It was not until I had two reasons to push me 
 that I made up my mind to go to Juilly. 
 
 First, Mademoiselle Henriette, whose service 
 in our ambulance had deprived her of all recrea- 
 tion, was anxious to see a big modern war 
 hospital, and I had it in my power to gratify her. 
 
 Second, I had an old friend — a priest — who is 
 
 79
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 a professor in the College de Juilly, part of which 
 has been given up to the hospital. This Abbe, 
 not unknown in Boston, — he once taught there, 
 — had marched away, with a gun on his shoulder, 
 in the days of September, 19 14, but later, being 
 delicate, it was decided that he was more useful 
 as a teacher than as a poilu^ and he sadly took off 
 his tunic and resumed his soutane. 
 
 The first visit led logically to the second. 
 Mademoiselle Henriette talked so much in our 
 modest little ambulance at Quincy of all the 
 wonders she had seen at Juilly, that our Medicin- 
 Chefy a clever Russian, was anxious to see it, and 
 I returned to introduce him and the directress of 
 the ambulance, who is the wife of our Mayor. I 
 made both visits inside of ten days. 
 
 You will begin to think that I am always 
 gadding. Well, it has been rather exciting for 
 the old lady these last weeks. I am afraid that 
 I was getting garden-bound, just as the army is 
 getting trench-bound, and, as ruling passions are 
 strong in death, in spite of myself, my visits to 
 Juilly took on a sort of before-the-war historical- 
 research spirit. 
 
 The College de Juilly, which has given up its 
 dormitories to the hospital, is an historical uni- 
 versity founded by the Orateriens, and situated 
 in one of the most extensive and picturesque 
 parks in the department of the Seine and Marne. 
 It was in that college that Stuart kings of England 
 educated their male offspring. There the Duke 
 of Monmouth, the over-ambitious and popular, 
 beloved son of Charles II, who made an almost 
 
 80
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 successful attempt to crowd his uncle off the 
 throne, was brought up, and there, also, the most 
 brilliant son of James II, — the Duke of Berwick 
 — whose mother, Arabella Churchill, was a sister 
 of the great Duke of Marlborough, got his 
 education, to which he did much honour. Per- 
 haps it was a pity that he was the illegitimate son. 
 English literature would have lost much of the 
 romance that Charles Edward and Bonnie Prince 
 Charlie inspired, but then also there would have 
 been no German blood in the English reigning 
 family. But perhapses are stupid. 
 
 We went out the first time in a rickety taxi- 
 auto, furnished by the woman at Meaux who had 
 taken me out on the battle-field in December, 
 just after the battle of the Marne. We went by 
 way of Mareuil, through Meaux, to take a 
 Senegalese, who had been nursed in our hospital, 
 back to his depot, and from there, by the route 
 Senlis, across the battle-field, towards Supplets, 
 where it began on September 5th. 
 
 It was a lovely day — sunny, under a pale blue 
 sky, silent, with just a puffy little breeze. The 
 roads were deserted, as we ran along through the 
 wide fields. The only signs of life were the big 
 ploughs turning up the ground for the winter 
 wheat planting, — huge ploughs drawn by four 
 and sometimes six great white oxen, moving 
 slowly in the foreground, in the middle distance, 
 and silhouetted on the hilltops against the sky- 
 line, guided by tall, sturdy, blond youths, in white 
 blouses, with a red band about their round caps 
 — German prisoners. Their air was as placid as 
 g 81
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 that of the big oxen they were driving, and the 
 glance they turned on us, as we joggled by in our 
 shaky taxi-cab, was as mildly indifferent as that 
 of their beasts. There was no one in sight to 
 guard them — there was no need. I am told that, 
 as a rule, they have no desire to escape — that is 
 to say, the common soldiers have not. With the 
 officers it is different. Many of them would get 
 away if they could on account of their careers. 
 But the common soldiers are good workers. They 
 are treated well. The fields of France are better 
 than the trenches and butchery. 
 
 I am not going to describe the hospital for 
 you. Don't think it. You, with your fifty-page 
 Sunday newspapers, and your numberless maga- 
 zines, get all of that sort of thing which is good 
 for you. 
 
 I am afraid that Henriette was even more 
 impressed by the nurses and the orderlies and 
 the stretcher-bearers than she was by the wonders 
 of the hospital equipment. She thought the 
 American girls " so handsome, and so smart," and 
 they were, — but, most of all, at tea in the huge 
 white refectory, she was impressed by the earner a- 
 derie between the men and women, as they sat 
 together over their tea. She had never seen 
 anything like that before in all her life. She 
 thought it charming, — wished the French could 
 arrive at it, — and declared the American women 
 the luckiest in the world, and I suppose that she 
 is not far wrong. 
 
 Some time in the future I shall take you to 
 Juilly. You will not see poilus done up in 
 
 82
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 bandages, or walking on crutches in the winding 
 streets of the old village, or lying on their mat- 
 tresses in the sun in the gardens, or sitting about 
 in the park. You will not see the pretty picture 
 which we saw from the window of the Abbe's 
 study — a white-robed, white-coifed nurse, sitting 
 on the pedestal of the tall statue of Sainte Gene- 
 vieve, with her white-shod feet sticking straight 
 out in front of her, and her young head bent over 
 a writing-pad, while the setting sun flecked the 
 white figures with shadows from the moving 
 leaves of the big trees about her. I felt as if a 
 sculptor ought to do her as symbolic. Monsieur 
 FAbbe 1 remarked, " She ought to be writing verses, 
 but I presume she is only writing home." I felt 
 myself that the home letter was more appropriate, 
 and felt it a pity that the home people could not 
 have seen the picture — the tired young nurse, 
 perhaps just escaped from the operating-room 
 (into which I had been allowed to peep, because 
 the doctor I had hoped to see, and one of the 
 nurses whose visit I was returning, were there, 
 done up in gauze, and unrecognizable) — to write 
 home in the beautiful, stately, historic park, at 
 the feet of the patron saint, whose faith had 
 turned back the Hun of ancient times, and whose 
 Paris the poi/us of to-day defend. But, though 
 you will not see that, you are sure to find many 
 reminders of the war days, in addition to the 
 portrait of the well-known American woman who 
 founded and sustains this great hospital, and 
 which will for all time hang there, with the por- 
 traits of the great men whose names have been 
 
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 associated with the college since its foundation. 
 The great park, the wonderful library, the famous 
 Salle des Bustes, the charming dining-room with 
 its carved wood walls and heavily carved doors, 
 and the terraced park, with its noble trees and 
 historic associations, will be all the more attractive 
 because it has been the scene of a fine American 
 effort, because American doctors and American 
 nurses have for three years already paced its hall, 
 keeping vigil by night and day, and rested their 
 tired nerves in the peaceful alleys of great trees, 
 adding their mite — and one of the noblest — not 
 only to the history of the place, but to the cement- 
 ing of the entente. I speak of the Americans, 
 but the nurses are not all American. There are 
 British, Canadians, and Australians, and there are 
 Belgians and French, and I don't know how many 
 nations represented in the personnel of the hos- 
 pital. And as they have served the civilian 
 population as part of their work, Juilly will never 
 again be just the sort of place it was before the 
 war, — for that matter, no place over here will. 
 
 We made our return by a shorter route, through 
 Trilbardou, and across the Marne at He de Ville- 
 noy, into Esbly. The bridge across the Marne 
 was one of those destroyed in September, 1914. 
 The old bridge was of stone. The new one is a 
 temporary one of wood — not wide enough for two 
 teams to pass. It is in the form of a broken 
 letter Z, so that when entering on one side it is 
 impossible to see whether or not the bridge is 
 free. There should be a guard there. Once 
 there was, but there was none that day. It is 
 
 84
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 not a frequented road. So as we made the first; 
 turn on the bridge, we found ourselves face to 
 face with a red cart drawn by a tiny donkey. 
 The donkey could not be backed — anyway, he 
 was further across the bridge than we were, — so 
 we had to back off, and let him pass. It was 
 rather a ticklish operation, but easier with an 
 auto than it would have been with a horse. 
 
 The second visit was rather a repetition of the 
 first, except that the doctor took us over in his 
 car, and we went much more quickly, and that 
 we had two little adventures en route. 
 
 The first was laughable, in a way. You know 
 there is no real hunting season any more, and the 
 fields are full of game. Partridges and pheasants 
 run about fearlessly. They have forgotten the 
 gun. Perhaps they know that Man has too much 
 else to do with guns to bother them. It is very 
 pretty to see the partridges running in the fields, 
 and not flying often, when one is quite on them, — 
 though it is such a menace to the crops. But it 
 was a hare that we started just out of Meaux. It 
 was going to cross the road when we rounded a 
 corner. I think it could have made the other 
 side, but it did not try. Instead, it started down 
 the road ahead of us to race the car. We were 
 going about thirty miles an hour, and the hare 
 beat us for ten minutes — gaining all the time — 
 until he got courage to side jump, and disappear 
 in the field. I never would have believed a hare 
 could make that pace, if I had not seen him 
 do it. 
 
 The second adventure was tragic. 
 
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 Just as we came in sight of Monge we saw a 
 smashed aeroplane lying in the field to the south, 
 not far from the road. We slowed down long 
 enough to make sure that it was deserted. We 
 knew it was a recent accident, as there was no one 
 near. It was a French plane, for one broken 
 wing displayed the tri-coloured rosette. There 
 was no one in sight when we reached it, but a 
 white-bloused German prisoner driving an ox-team 
 in the field on the other side of the road; but as 
 we put on speed again, we saw, coming towards 
 us in a cloud of dust, a French military car, and 
 as it approached we saw French officers standing, 
 looking off, ready to spring, and knew that they 
 were seeking for the machine. We hurried away, 
 to learn on arriving at Juilly, ten minutes later, 
 that the accident had been seen from the upper 
 ward windows, and that the ambulance had been 
 out, and brought back the two men — both dead. 
 
 Things like that do not upset one to-day as 
 they once did. But all the time I was walking 
 through the hospital, talking to the poilus, 1 had 
 the dead aviators on my mind. It did seem so 
 pitiful to have fallen to death over the peaceful 
 sunny fields of their beloved France, under the 
 bovine eyes of a German prisoner. To die in an 
 air battle is a different thing from dying like that, 
 and I could not but pity them, little as death 
 seems pitiful to me to-day. 
 
 While I write all this — I think of the battle in 
 Flanders, and of all that France is enduring and 
 must endure in the reforming of her republicanism. 
 Be sure she can do it. All the pacifist disturbances 
 
 86
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 have only shown her the necessity, and meanwhile 
 the world at large is learning how to judge a nation 
 by the results of its efforts and not by the acts of 
 its individuals. I suppose those who believe that 
 the beauty of life lies in the struggle are right, 
 but the trying part for me is that it looks so much 
 finer in history than it does in the doing. That 
 is probably because I have not a great and calm 
 mind. 
 
 87
 
 XI 
 
 October 10, 191 7 
 
 I have just come back from Paris. I went 
 up to see what could be done to ameliorate the 
 situation for the winter. We are to have almost 
 no fuel. If I can keep a fire going in the kitchen 
 and manage a wood fire for evenings in the salon, 
 it will be about all I can do. But I have laid in, 
 by luck, some petrole — taken over from a friend 
 who is going to return to the States, — so I have 
 put in two petrole stoves — one to heat the break- 
 fast-table, and one upstairs, beside my typewriter, 
 so that I can write in moderate comfort. It is 
 not a healthy heat — but it is all I can do. 
 
 Everything is calm here, in spite of the battle 
 going on in the north, and all the political excite- 
 ment in Paris. 
 
 I am sure that the American papers are giving 
 you all the details of the excitement stirred up by 
 Leon Daudet. I can only hope he has not gone 
 off half-cocked. The papers give us no clue to 
 the facts of the case. Unluckily, in all three of 
 the principal books which Daudet has published 
 since the war broke out, — all rich reading, — he 
 has been so unbridled in his attacks on so 
 many prominent people, — literary, mondial, and 
 
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 political, — that I can't help trembling. The sort 
 of attack he has often made on people about whom 
 I know something does not inspire me with un- 
 questioning confidence, although I know that 
 almost any one put under the microscope might 
 give some such record as Daudet gets with his 
 humorous, often ugly, southern temperament. 
 No one questions Daudet's patriotism, although 
 he is an unqualified royalist, — but then, everyone 
 has always known that. It is the policy of his 
 paper. However, if the hearings — now secret — 
 are over and the most dangerous, as well as one 
 of the most brilliant, unscrupulous and wicked 
 men in Paris, is caught in the net, I shall feel 
 that the excitement, unfortunate and untimely as 
 it is, has been worth while. I cannot help feeling 
 that, in a sense, this is only the third act of the 
 Calmette-Caillaux affair which preceded the war, 
 in which Calmette was killed — the first of his party 
 " mort pour la Patrie" as much as if he had been 
 killed on the battlefield. I suppose there is no 
 such audacious man in France as Joseph Caillaux. 
 But whether he is innocent enough to escape 
 always is the question. 
 
 It is rather a pity that France should have to 
 operate upon this ulcer in war-time. But the sore 
 has been gathering for a good while, and I suppose 
 the sooner it is attended to in a public clinic the 
 better for the country, — army, government, public 
 service and all. It will probably empty out a lot 
 of people whom public life — or life at all — will 
 not know any longer. You can't deny that it 
 takes a plucky nation to gather round an operating- 
 
 8 9
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 table at such a time — if they do, and I believe 
 they will. 
 
 The streets of Paris are full of American boys 
 in khaki, sombreros, and new tan gaiters, and all 
 behaving as if they were here for a sort of glorifi- 
 cation. In a sense it is a big adventure for them, 
 and for some it will be " the big adventure " — to 
 come over the sea, all dressed up in new uniforms, 
 to walk about the streets of Paris, before going 
 on " out there." No one blames them for enjoy- 
 ing it, any more than any one blames them for 
 looking rather like the supers in a Charlie Froh- 
 man border drama. In fact every one likes them, 
 just as they are, and the French are quite daft 
 about them. It is a case of " love at first sight," 
 only I am told that boys arriving after this are not 
 likely to see Paris until they come back from 
 "out there." 
 
 On my return trip from Paris I met a young 
 officer from the Pacific coast, who, in the course 
 of conversation, said to me : " It is odd. These 
 people do not look a bit like us. They don't 
 speak our language. I speak very little of theirs. 
 But somehow they are like us. I felt at home 
 with them at once, and every day I feel more 
 at home. I don't know why it is — can't 
 explain it." 
 
 So you see not all the boys are homesick, as I 
 feared they were. 
 
 Speaking of them — the other day a young 
 French officer, who is in the aviation corps in a 
 camp near St. Nazaire, and who belongs to the 
 
 90
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 fleet which goes out to meet the American trans- 
 ports coming into a French port, told me that his 
 first westward flight to protect the incoming 
 American troops was one of the most thrilling 
 days of his life. I got quite excited myself 
 listening to his description of the flight over the 
 submarine zone to meet the fleet, flying so low 
 that he could see the khaki-clad lads, in their life- 
 belts, packed on the decks, waving their caps in 
 the air, and imagined he could hear their shouts 
 of " Vive la France ! " 
 
 I don't seem to be able to write about anything 
 to-day but " our boys." 
 
 As for that, every one talks about them, and 
 when any of the people here see them passing on 
 the grande route, you would surely think, to hear 
 the jabbering about it, that they had brought the 
 " Glory of the Lord " with them. I hope they 
 have. 
 
 Some of their experiences in getting our men 
 acclimated are funny enough. For example, the 
 friend with whom I make my home in Paris is an 
 unofficial " aunt " to any number of American 
 lads, the sons of her old friends and otherwise. 
 The other day she had as an unexpected guest to 
 dinner a youngster from the flying corps. I went 
 out to buy a few things to supplement a war 
 repast up to the appetite of a healthy boy, and he 
 went along with me to carry the bundles. We 
 ended in a cake-shop — they are not shut yet — 
 one of the prettiest in a smart quarter, and I made 
 a collection of things which I thought a boy with 
 
 9 1
 
 (C 
 
 u 
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 a sweet tooth would like, and could not get in 
 camp. When I went to the desk to pay, the 
 cashier mentioned the sum, but she added : 
 " Monsieur has been eating cakes ? " 
 
 Instinctively I said " No," to look round and 
 find him with his mouth full, and another dainty 
 poised at his lips. 
 
 How many ? " I asked with a laugh. 
 
 How many what ? " 
 
 How many cakes have you eaten ? " 
 c These little things with petticoats ? I don't 
 know. Three or four." I nodded to the cashier. 
 She mentioned the price, and as I paid it, he 
 simply shouted : "What ? You are not going 
 to pay for those piffling little things ? Why at 
 home we always sample these things in a shop." 
 
 " But you are not at home," I replied. " We'll 
 discuss it outside," and in the street I explained 
 the French cake-shop system to him, to his deep 
 amusement. He had only been in Paris twenty- 
 four hours, — it was his first visit, and this was his 
 first appearance in a cake-shop. He could not 
 get over the " absurdity," as he called it. 
 
 Many of the boys down in the camps near 
 Chalons have had the same difficulty in mastering 
 French ideas and traditions regarding fruit hanging 
 on trees. 
 
 You know the American boy's point of view 
 regarding fruit in our land, where orchards are 
 big. It is half the fun of being a boy. If the 
 farmer catches the young marauders at work he 
 chases them with whip and bad words, or exercises 
 
 92
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 his skill in throwing stones. Boys put their 
 thumbs to their noses, give the traditional waggle 
 with their fingers, and cut for it. 
 
 Here in France it is a crime to steal fruit, a 
 crime for which one can be arrested, imprisoned, 
 or fined — and the law is enforced. Until the 
 harvest is over one cannot even pick up an apple 
 from the ground to which it has fallen from a 
 tree overhanging the road, without risk of being 
 punished. At a certain date, fixed by the commune, 
 the town-crier beats his drum and announces the 
 harvest over, and after that date, fruit not 
 harvested can be picked up. 
 
 Of course the American boys had never heard 
 of this when they came. They know all about 
 it now. Some of them have had the fact very 
 forcibly impressed on their minds, to their deep 
 disgust. 
 
 " What," exclaimed one youngster, " we have 
 come over to fight for these people, and they 
 won't let us pick up an apple ? What rot ! ' 
 And it was just there that one young American 
 had it emphatically brought home to him that he 
 had not come over here to " fight for these 
 people," but to fight for his own liberty, and that 
 "these people" had really been fighting for him 
 for three years, and he must hurry up and get 
 ready to " go in it " before " these people " were 
 too exhausted. I suppose it is absurd to put it 
 that way, because they are far from done up yet, 
 although if there were not something almost 
 superhuman in them, they would be. 
 
 93
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Here we have been occupied, all of us, in 
 seeing what could be done to dress the children 
 for school this winter. 
 
 It is going to be a hard winter. 
 
 Many of these serious, thrifty women have 
 larger families than you think. We have over 
 sixty families in the commune who have more than 
 three children. There is one at Joncheroy of 
 eight, the oldest only twelve — and three pairs 
 of twins. They run together in summer, a dirty, 
 gay, barelegged, barefooted troop, each in one 
 ragged garment, doing their little chores, picking 
 up brushwood and dragging it home, with the 
 tiniest tot trotting after them. But when school 
 begins, according to the French school regulations, 
 they must be cleaned and combed, and shod, and 
 I assure you they always are. But it is hard work. 
 Of course the French tradition that puts all public- 
 school children into the uniform black aprons is 
 a great help. 
 
 In the three years since the war broke out 
 many of these women have had to spend their 
 savings. Many of them, with that French love 
 of owning land of which I have written you, have 
 invested their savings in that way. A great 
 many of them own an extra house which they 
 rent for 150 fr. to 250 fr. a year. But no rents 
 have been paid since the war began, and they 
 can't eat their houses, and would die before they 
 would sell. These are things that don't show on 
 the surface, and no one complains. How can 
 they when the refugees we always have with us 
 
 94
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 emphasize the fact that we who have not lost our 
 homes are lucky. So it was only when it was 
 time for the school to open that it was discovered 
 how many children had no shoes, and the 
 communal caisse de bienfaisance nearly empty. 
 However, the Americans came to our assistance, 
 and the children went to school. 
 
 Our food problem is going to be a hard one. 
 So far as 1 am personally concerned it is better 
 than it was last year, for I have a greater variety 
 of vegetables and plenty of apples, and there 
 again the women of the States have generously 
 helped with condensed milk for the children and 
 old people and with large quantities of rice and 
 prunes and sugar and such things. So you see 
 that far away as I am from you in this quiet place 
 where we are always looking at the war, I can still 
 bear witness that the loving hearts in the States 
 are ever on the watch for our needs. If it is 
 more blessed to give than to receive — and I know 
 it is — there must be many in the States who are 
 happy in these days of giving with both hands 
 and full hearts. 
 
 Tell me, — over there, are you all forgetting, as 
 we are, how it used to be before this war came ? 
 One thing I know, people who expect when this 
 is over to come back to the France of before the 
 war are going to be mightily disillusioned. The 
 France of the old days is gone for ever. 1 believe 
 that all over the world it will be the same. We 
 none of us shall get back to that, but I have faith 
 to believe that we are turning our faces towards 
 
 95
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 something much better. If we are not, then all 
 the great sacrifice has been in vain. 
 
 It is getting cold and late, so this must answer 
 for to-day. 
 
 I hope this time I have talked about our boys 
 enough to suit you, though I am sure you will 
 always be calling for " more." 
 
 9 6
 
 XII 
 
 November i, 191 7 
 
 It would be laughable, if it were not tragic, for 
 me to recall how many times in the last thirty- 
 nine months I have said " these are the worst days 
 of the war." Well, each month takes a step 
 forward in endurance, and each step forward bears 
 witness to what we can endure, if we must. Pos- 
 sibly the future holds worse, but we don't know it. 
 
 The desertion of Russia tries our patience even 
 here in this quiet place. What must it be like 
 " out there " ? Of course the Allies have got to 
 show great indulgence to Russia — it is that, or 
 flinging the nation — with its great territory, un- 
 developed resources and future wealth — into the 
 hands of Germany. As it is, we can't do much 
 except be patient with them — and arrange the 
 matter after we get through licking Germany. 
 
 Though I know, as I have known from the 
 first, that we were going to do it, I don't deny 
 that I study the map to-day with a nervous dread 
 of what is before us on the road. It becomes us 
 to do that. I own to trembling. Why not ? 
 We've got the first. results of the Russian down- 
 fall — the terrific drive on Italy, and the loss of all 
 they won in the spring — just so much work to do 
 over again. 
 
 97
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Don't imagine for one moment that I think 
 that these things are disastrous. I don't. But 
 there is no use denying that they are — unfortunate, 
 and that the loss of so many men, so much 
 material, and worst of all, the methods by which 
 it is done, are mightily upsetting. It stirs 
 still deeper the pacifist sets and the cowards — and 
 cowardice has no race. It sets the socialists 
 running amuck. It disturbs the army, of course, 
 and that's the worst of it. But can you wonder ? 
 I repeat what I wrote you in a recent letter, which 
 you evidently had not received when you wrote 
 the one now before me — received yesterday, and 
 dated October 5th, about the time I must have 
 been writing to you of my visit to Juilly, — that 
 the political upheaval is not so important as you 
 seem to fear. 
 
 Anyway, it has comic opera episodes. Here is 
 one. 
 
 Leon Daudet, who, if he did not open the ball, 
 led the most important figure in the dance, having 
 dealt out domiciliary visits to a number of promi- 
 nent politicians, in true revolutionary spirit, got 
 the same thing wished on him. In a counter 
 attack he was accused of preparing a royalist plot 
 to overthrow the republic. Of course, it never 
 has been any secret that he would, if he could. 
 He does not love the present republic. Lots of 
 honest French people don't. Amelie doesn't. 
 She is more royalist than the king. But though 
 Leon Daudet is no respecter of accepted reputa- 
 tions, and has no bump of reverence, he is no 
 fool, and he is a far too loyal Frenchman, and too 
 
 98
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 ardently anxious for an Allied victory, to under- 
 take any such stupid and impossible thing as a 
 " restoration," in these days of desperate fighting. 
 The accusation against him took the form of the 
 statement that a depot of arms destined to put a 
 royalist party in fighting trim was found in his 
 office. The depot of arms was proved to be one 
 of those ornamental panoplies in which men 
 delight as a decoration. This contained — among 
 other things — five revolvers of various patterns, a 
 dagger in a sheath, two harmless weapons marked 
 as souvenirs of a royalist plot of other days — 
 perhaps that of Deroulede in the time of Felix 
 Faure's death — two coup de poing Americain^ and 
 half a dozen old pis to/ets of ancient history — a pretty 
 armament to equip royalist conspirators in these 
 days of the soixante-quinze and the hand-grenade. 
 Writers of comic opera ought to take notice. 
 Paris laughed, and so would an audience. One 
 thing is sure. Daudet has scored the first laugh. 
 It looks as if he would score something more 
 serious. We may see a procession of men whose 
 faces have been more or less familiar to the public, 
 and whose names are not unknown in New York, 
 up against a wall at Vincennes, with a firing squad 
 in front of them. I for one hope so, for the 
 good of the future. 
 
 99
 
 XIII 
 
 November 26, 1917 
 
 Here we are, almost into December ; one 
 could have no doubt of it, it has been so cold, 
 and I have absolutely no real fuel. We have 
 actually done what little cooking there is over a 
 fire of chips. Did you ever try. to do that ? I 
 suppose you have when you camped out. That 
 is a different thing. I'd adore to have you see 
 Amelie. She arrives with her felt shoes — high 
 ones — in her sabots. She has a knitted bolero 
 over her wrapper, a long knitted sweater over 
 that, and a big ulster to top her off, and a 
 knitted cap on her head. She does the cooking 
 — such as it is — in that attire. Of course this 
 means a fire for a couple of hours in the morning 
 — the rest of the day no fire at all, — and cold 
 suppers. It means going to bed with the dark, 
 and putting on mittens to read in bed. In this 
 inventive age, I do wish some ingenious person 
 would devise an automatic book-holder, which 
 would not only hold the book at any angle, 
 according to the light needed, but turn the pages. 
 
 I'd love to give you an atmospheric picture of 
 what my little cold house looks like, when I come 
 downstairs in the morning. But piercing chill — 
 though it is actually visible — cannot be pictured. 
 
 100
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Of course I don't expect this condition to 
 last. I've cords and cords of wood ordered. 
 Some of it will come, I suppose, some day. 
 
 In all ways that I could I provided for this. 
 I am done up in flannel. I wear nothing but 
 velveteens, and am never without a fur. I run 
 about out of doors all I can — only it is so muddy. 
 I have tried every year to put sand on the 
 garden paths, but have never been able to get it 
 hauled from the He de Villenoy. If I only had 
 had that, I could follow what sun there is about 
 the house. 
 
 To sadden us all a little, our ambulance has 
 been closed, as are all formations of less than fifty 
 beds, — question of heat and light. The tiny 
 hospital has been a source of great interest and 
 diversion to all of us. Ever since people knew it 
 was here, every one of the American organizations 
 and a great number of private people in the States 
 have taken a kindly interest in it — the Red Cross, 
 the Comile pour les Blesses Francais, and so many 
 others, like Mrs. Griggs of New York, whose 
 name became very familiar to nurses and poilus, 
 especially after she visited them. In fact, the 
 little Quincy hospital, which always flew the Stars 
 and Stripes on all American fete days, was by its 
 American friends beautifully equipped and never 
 lacked for anything. 
 
 The boys were very happy there. I can't tell 
 you how they love being nursed in a small ambu- 
 lance. There is something so much more intime^ 
 especially when they are convalescent, and can 
 not only sit out in the garden, but go to their 
 
 101
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 meals in the huge light refectory of the patronage 
 of the town — a clean, square room, with well- 
 scrubbed deal tables about three sides, and the 
 wonderful cook — herself a war widow — presiding 
 over the big stove at the other end, and all the 
 white-clad nurses, including the directress herself, 
 distinguished by her blue veil, presiding over the 
 service. Needless to say, the sort of cooking 
 they got was quite different from that possible in 
 the huge hospitals, and they appreciated it. 
 
 Well, it is closed, alas ! and its history entered 
 in the record of the commune. We shall all 
 miss it. 
 
 As its end was not foreseen, there was con- 
 siderable material left over — canned food, con- 
 densed milk, as well as all the sheets and clothing. 
 
 So, three days after the closing — the commune 
 having politely asked my consent — the town-crier 
 beat his drum at the cross-roads, and informed 
 the people of the two communes that the wives of 
 men at the front, war widows, and the refugees 
 were invited to present themselves at the Mairie 
 next day, when the Maire would distribute " les 
 restes des dons Americains ' remaining at the 
 ambulance. So the Stars and Stripes were hung 
 over the door of the Maine, and the distribution 
 was made. 
 
 No one is going to feel the vide this will make 
 in our daily lives as much as Mademoiselle 
 Henriette, who, after three years of arduous daily 
 service, finds herself idle, and, what she minds 
 more, dressed as a civilian. 
 
 I imagine that we shall not keep her here long. 
 
 102
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 She has always consoled herself for her humble 
 position, while longing for a front line hospital, 
 with the fact that her work was hard. So there 
 is small probability of her reconciling herself to 
 idleness. 
 
 This morning 1 had a splendid bonfire — burned 
 up all the asparagus bushes in Pere's garden. It 
 was smoky work, but I got warm. Now I am 
 going to plant tulips, and pot geraniums. This 
 last is a joke. I do it every year, but I rarely 
 save any. I have no proper place to put them 
 away. I have tried every place in the house and 
 out, so you can guess at the kind of cold we have 
 here. This year I have less space than usual, as 
 the arrangements for the winter cantonnements are 
 more extensive than they used to be. I have had 
 to clear out the cellar on the north side, where I 
 have always kept coal and wood, to make a place 
 there for twenty soldiers. So, if 1 get fuel, it will 
 have to go into the one on the west side, where I 
 keep my garden stuff". 
 
 We have had no cantonnement yet, though there 
 is a big one down the hill at Couilly and St. 
 Germain. 
 
 Yesterday I saw these men for the first time. 
 I went over to Voulangis by train, and Amelie 
 drove me to the station. On the route nationale 
 I met several soldiers strolling up the hill in a 
 uniform that I did not know, — far the smartest 
 French soldiers I had ever seen, — dark blue 
 (almost black) snug-fitting knee-breeches, tight 
 tunics, brown leggings and belts and black berets. 
 Ju'st before we got to the foot of the hill I heard 
 
 103
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 music, and as we turned into Couilly we found 
 the street crowded, and saw, advancing from 
 St. Germain toward the bridge over the Morin, 
 which separates the two villages, a big military- 
 band filling the street from sidewalk to sidewalk, 
 the sun shining on their brass instruments as the 
 trumpeters whirled them in the air. 
 
 It was a new experience for Ninette. I don't 
 believe she had ever seen anything like it in all 
 her long life. As it was impossible to pass, I got 
 out and went across the bridge on foot. I had 
 to thread my way through the crowd, among 
 whom were a great number of poilus in the same 
 uniform, so I took the first opportunity to ask 
 what regiment it was, to be told — the Chasseurs 
 Alpins. So I have seen them at last, and a 
 regiment wearing a fouragere. 
 
 When I reached home that night — I drove 
 from Voulangis — I found Amelie just putting 
 Ninette up. I had left her at two o'clock. J 
 returned at seven. When I asked where she had 
 been, she told me that she had put Ninette in the 
 shed at the coal man's and followed the band to 
 the square to hear the music, — the square is just 
 across the road, — and that Ninette had enjoyed 
 the music, in fact she had danced all the time, 
 and was so tired that it had taken her nearly an 
 hour and a half to climb the hill. I suspect that 
 Amelie, who adores dancing, judged Ninette by 
 herself. 
 
 The atmosphere is rather vibrating here. All 
 this defeatist propaganda is trying to our nerves 
 and our tempers. It is logical enough, but it is 
 
 104
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 ringing the death knell of socialism among the 
 farmers. The real truth of the tension is, of 
 course,, the Russian situation. There has been 
 so much sentimentality about Russia, and so 
 much ignorance, and every day seems to bring 
 its own special disillusion. At the time of the 
 abdication of the Czar, the event was given 
 considerable dignity here. Later, when the 
 menace of the separate peace began to loom up, 
 with its liberation not only of the soldiers on the 
 Russian frontier, but of the supposed-to-be millions 
 of German prisoners, optimists argued that the 
 Germans who were in Russia at the time of the 
 revolution would be more likely to sow revolution 
 in Germany than docilely re-enter the shambles. 
 Error again. 
 
 My own head gets confused at times. Can 
 you wonder that these people about me cannot 
 see straight ? We have all blundered so. I 
 cannot help asking myself if we. shall blunder on 
 to the end. I really get weary of hearing the 
 peace terms of the Allies discussed. I know that 
 it has to be, that it is absolutely necessary, since 
 the days of secret diplomacy are over, that the 
 truth of what the Allied nations are struggling for 
 — and must have — should be kept eternally before 
 the eyes of the world — lest they forget. But I 
 long so to think of nothing but licking the 
 Germans, and talking after that is done. There 
 are moments when I feel that every one of us — 
 women and children as well as men — ought to 
 be marching out towards that battle-line — if only 
 to die there. I am laughing while I write that 
 
 105
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 sentence, for I have a vision of myself limping 
 along, carrying a gun in both hands — I could not 
 lift it with one — and falling down, and having to 
 be carefully stood lip again. We mere lookers-on 
 encumber the earth at this epoch — the epoch of 
 the young and the active. 
 
 There was a time when we used to talk of 
 such things as nobility and chivalry. Both are 
 with us still. Poets and painters, romance writers 
 and dramatists have glorified both in the wars of 
 the past, and shrined them under a halo of im- 
 mortality. The future will do that for this war. 
 
 I am getting terribly impatient of words — of 
 everything, in fact, but deeds. I am beginning 
 to feel as Amelie does. The other day there was 
 a criticism of a military operation in the English 
 parliament, and she said, impatiently : " Well, if 
 I were Haig I would simply reply, l If you don't 
 like the way I am doing this thing, just get down 
 off your cushioned seats, and come out and face 
 the guns yourselves.' " 
 
 She does not know whether the benches in the 
 House of Commons are cushioned or not. For 
 that matter, neither do I. It is a short-sighted 
 point of view, but I often feel the same way 
 myself. 
 
 1 06
 
 XIV 
 
 December 20, 1917 
 
 Nearly a month since I last wrote. So I 
 suppose all through January 1 shall be getting 
 letters of reproach from you. I can't help it, and 
 I've not an excuse to throw at you, — simply had 
 nothing to write about. Things are happening 
 every day, everywhere, but I am not writing a 
 history of the war, and nothing happens here. 
 We are simply holding on and smiling, and I 
 suppose we shall continue to do that until the 
 boys from the States are in real fighting trim. 
 
 The only piece of news at my house is that my 
 little kitty, Didine, is dead, and buried on the top 
 of a hill in Pere's garden under a white lilac bush. 
 It is absurd to grieve in these days for a cat, but 
 he was the only affectionate cat I ever knew. I 
 miss him terribly, especially in the evenings, when 
 he always sat on my knee while I read. 
 
 My English friends at the cantine of Meaux 
 have moved on toward the front to a place called 
 Serche, near Baisne, in the Aisne, in the part of 
 the territory liberated last March. There they 
 have a wonderful foyer for two thousand soldiers, 
 a cantonnement — library, concert hall, tennis courts, 
 tea rooms — in fact everything which can help the 
 soldiers to feel at home and cared for. 
 
 107
 
 THE PEAK OF THE .LOAD 
 
 I had a letter from them yesterday, telling me 
 that they had arrived safely with their saddle-horse 
 and their dog, and that they had a royal reception, 
 that they had found their little house all ready, — 
 a pretty demountable structure — for everything 
 there had been destroyed, — painted green, and 
 most attractively placed. The letter added, 
 " There were flowers everywhere — even bouquets 
 in each of our bedrooms — but, alas ! there were 
 no wash-hand bowls." 
 
 I loved that. It is so adorably French. 
 
 I am sure that you are just as much impressed 
 as we are with the idea that the English have 
 taken Jerusalem. Shades of Richard Cceur de 
 Lion ! * Just think of General Allenby marching 
 his army piously into the Holy City, and writing 
 his name in history along with St. Louis and all 
 the bands of Crusaders. Yet we are all too 
 occupied with nearer things to do more than turn 
 our eyes in that direction, give a thought to the 
 stirring visions it calls up, and then mentally 
 return to the nearer battle-field. 
 
 I am going up to Paris for Christmas. I am 
 urged,, and there seems to be no reason why 
 should not, or, for that matter, why I should. I 
 will write as soon as I return. 
 
 108
 
 XV 
 
 January 15, 191 8 
 
 Again it is more than three weeks since I 
 wrote, but this time I really am not to blame. 
 
 I wrote you that I was going up to Paris to 
 spend Christmas. I fully intended to be back 
 here before New Year's Day, which is the great 
 French fete day. It was very cold when I left 
 here, and every day the mercury dropped a little 
 lower, until it began to snow, with the result that 
 I was not able to leave Paris until January 5th. 
 
 I had telegraphed Amelie that I would be back 
 on Thursday, the 27th, but the weather was so 
 bad that it was impossible, and I sent word that 
 I would let her know when to expect me — as soon 
 as the snow stopped. Several days went by before 
 it seemed wise to start, and then when I tele- 
 graphed, Amelie replied that I was to stay where 
 I was until our roads were in better condition, 
 that the hill was a sheer sheet of ice, and that 
 neither the horse nor the donkey could possibly 
 climb it. 
 
 So there I was stranded in Paris. By the 
 Friday after New Year's, I began to feel pretty 
 desperate, when suddenly there came a call on 
 the telephone, and there was Mademoiselle 
 Henriette in Paris. She said she had just arrived, 
 
 109
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 and that she was going back in the morning ; that 
 the 215th infantry had arrived and was cantonned 
 in the commune, that the Captain was going to 
 send a military wagon to the station in the 
 morning to fetch her, and that she had told Amelie 
 that she should bring me back, if I wanted to 
 come, and of course I did. 
 
 So Saturday at noon I was in the train, where 
 I discovered that the wagon was to meet us at 
 Esbly, not Couilly. Mademoiselle Henriette was 
 a little upset when she saw my surprise. You 
 see she is young and vigorous, and in good 
 weather she never thought of taking the train at 
 Couilly. She gaily footed it to Esbly, five miles 
 away. She had not even thought how much 
 easier it would have been for the horses to take 
 us from Couilly — two miles of hill instead of 
 five. 
 
 At Esbly we found the wagon awaiting us. 
 You ought to have seen me boosted into it. I 
 sat on a box in the back, so that the adjutant who 
 drove and Mademoiselle Henriette could shelter 
 me a bit, — we had no covers. My, it was cold ! 
 The wind blew a gale from the north. The road 
 was a sheet of ice, and the poor horse pulled and 
 tugged and slipped. The steepest part of it was 
 through the town of Conde, and I never realized 
 how steep that road was until I saw the horse 
 being led and pushed up it that terribly cold day. 
 
 I reached home about frozen, to find the house 
 looking gay, and a huge fire in the salon, — but 
 no Amelie. They told me she had supposed we 
 were coming by Couilly and had gone on foot to 
 
 no
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 meet us, with rugs and foot-warmer. She got 
 back about ten minutes after we did — in such a 
 state of perspiration, lugging the big foot-warmer, 
 ful of hot charcoal, wapped in a big carriage-rug. 
 I expected her to fuss, after making a trip of nearly 
 four miles on foot, carrying such a bundle. But 
 she did not. I sat behind a screen by the fire and 
 thawed out. In spite of the fire the house was a 
 refrigerator. Amelie told me there had been hot- 
 water bottles in my bed all day, as the sheets were 
 so cold she was afraid I would get a congestion ; I 
 did not. But I slept with a hot-water bottle in 
 my arms and a hot brick in each of the bottom 
 corners of my bed. 
 
 The presence of the 215th makes the place very 
 gay again. It is a crack regiment from the north. 
 Most of the men and fully half of the officers are 
 from Lille — men who have practically had no news 
 from their families since August, 19 14. 
 
 I had a war tea the Sunday after I got home — 
 six officers and Mademoiselle Henriette sitting 
 round the table — and we talked morals and history, 
 philosophy and literature — no war. 
 
 There are some charming men in the regiment 
 — men who in civil life are bankers, lawyers and 
 manufacturers — almost no professional soldiers. 
 In the ranks are some of the most amusing poilus 
 I have yet encountered. For instance, there 
 is a bombardier with a gold bomb on his sleeve, 
 though I neglected to ask what it meant. He 
 speaks English, and when he heard that there was 
 an English-speaking woman in the commune he 
 felt that he ought to come and present his 
 
 in
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 respects. He came, and gave me a few as hearty 
 laughs as I have had since the war began. 
 
 He was a queer type. He was pure French — 
 born in Lille of French parents, but taken to 
 England when he was very young by a widowed 
 mother, sent to school there, and his home is still 
 at St. Helier, where he left a wife and baby. 
 
 I wish you could have heard him, in the broadest 
 cockney English, tell the tale of his difficulties in 
 getting himself enrolled in the French army. 
 
 Born in France, brought up in England, never 
 knowing a word of French until he was out of 
 school, he had never taken out English naturaliza- 
 tion papers, and never intended to. 
 
 A few years before the war broke out — at the 
 age of eighteen, he left Jersey, and came to France 
 to offer to do his military service. He spoke 
 almost no French, and fell in with an officer who 
 did not care to bother with him, as he did not 
 seem to be very well able to explain what he 
 wanted. He did not have the proper papers. 
 He did not know what he needed, or how to get 
 them. He only knew that he had arrived at the age 
 when a Frenchman ought to be in a caserne. No 
 one else seemed to care a rap whether he was or 
 not, so he went back to Jersey, with his feelings 
 very much hurt. He had wanted to do his duty. 
 No one cared. So he went back to his farm, took 
 off his store clothes, put on his blouse, and 
 practically felt, " Devil take my native land." 
 
 Well, not long after that it looked as though 
 the devil, was going to obey him. Once more 
 he went to Lille. Again he presented himself. 
 
 112
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 This time war had begun, and he was looked 
 upon as " suspect." How dare a man speaking 
 English and French equally atrociously, and with 
 no proper papers, claim to be a Frenchman ? 
 This time he was madder still. The military 
 authorities did not know anything about him. 
 Apparently they did want him. A sympathetic 
 drill sergeant suggested that if he were anxious 
 to fight there was always the Foreign Legion, 
 and no questions asked. 
 
 11 No, I'll be hanged if I do," he said to himself. 
 " I'll enlist in the English army." So off he 
 went to London. But in London it was necessary 
 to lie. If he told the recruiting officer there that 
 he was born a Frenchman, of course he could not 
 take him. He began by saying he was English, 
 born at St. Helier, but he was not a neat liar, and 
 he soon got so twisted up that he was frightened, 
 broke down and told the truth ; explained that he 
 had twice been to France, but as he had no birth 
 certificate, was not even sure of the date, etc., had 
 never lived in France since he was a baby, had no 
 idea how to go to work to put himself en regle^ so, 
 as he wanted to fight, he had thought that England 
 might take him. 
 
 The recruiting officer in London was sym- 
 pathetic. He took down the facts, and told the 
 lad to go home and wait until the matter could be 
 straightened out. But the war was a year old 
 before he was finally called, and entered as the 
 rawest kind of a raw recruit. 
 
 The story itself is amusing, but you should 
 have heard him tell it — half in cockney English, 
 
 1 113
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 and half in barrack-room French. It was killing. 
 I heard more words that were new to me than I 
 have heard in an age. I wanted to stop him 
 every two minutes, and either get a slang dictionary 
 or call for a word-of-mouth translation. But he 
 talked so fast, and gesticulated so that I managed 
 to get it. I nearly upset myself trying not to laugh 
 while he described his early days of hurried train- 
 ing. He visualized himself standing the first day 
 with the contents of his sac about his feet, trying 
 in vain to remember the names of all the articles, 
 and to get them back compactly into the sac, from 
 which the drill corporal had tumbled them. . He 
 was even funnier when he told about his efforts 
 to conquer military etiquette, — to salute the 
 proper person and recognize his rank at sight, 
 never to salute when he had on no head covering, 
 for every one to him was " mister " and he had 
 never even heard of the shades in salutation. 
 
 But if he was awkward in many ways compared 
 to some of his comrades, the moment he got a 
 bomb or a grenade into his hand it was another 
 matter. There he had the advantage of having 
 played English sports all his life. I never realized 
 that he was a fine type until I saw him giving a 
 lesson in bomb-throwing out in the fields. When 
 he straightened up and swung his arm into the 
 air, I appreciated that he was a fine type and 
 graceful. 
 
 The intense cold shows signs of moderating. 
 My tulips are beginning to come up. 
 
 At last Caillaux is in the Sante, waiting to be 
 tried for high treason. Well, it is a comfort. He 
 
 114
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 ought to be left there in silence, isolated and for- 
 gotten, until the war is over. But, alas ! although 
 this is really no time for an operation on the great 
 scandal and clearing up the terrible plotting of 
 which he is possibly the centre, it has to be done. 
 We have been bringing into force all kinds of laws 
 to prevent holding him in silence. Merely 
 the habeas corpus is enough. Some of our most 
 prized reforms are inconvenient at times, aren't 
 they ? 
 
 "5
 
 XVI 
 
 February I, 1 91 8 
 
 This morning it looks to me as if all we have 
 been dreading since the Russians deserted us is 
 likely to come true. One thing is certain. The 
 German offensive is not going to be long retarded, 
 and what is surer still is that it is going to be 
 preluded by a desperate German effort to terrorize 
 the civilians, and break the morale en arriere. Of 
 course that is another bit of false psychology. 
 There is nothing which pulls the French together 
 like a blow. 
 
 Of course you know that Paris has enjoyed a 
 strange immunity from air raids. While England 
 has been attacked night after night, Paris has been 
 spared. I'd hate to tell you of all the theories I 
 have heard exploited in explanation. I've had 
 some theories myself. There were people who 
 believed that the defences of Paris could not be 
 passed by the German air fleet. I had for a time 
 the illusion that perhaps this was true, until I 
 was told one day by an aviator that the German 
 fleet in the air could attack Paris whenever it was 
 ready, and, that while aerial methods of attack 
 had made great progress in the past three years, 
 no method of defence was by any means a sure 
 protection. 
 
 116
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 On dit that the reason for the persistent action 
 against England is explained by the hesitation of 
 the French to follow England's example and give 
 the Germans tit for tat by attacking the Rhine 
 towns. As the German civilians are much more 
 nervous than either the French or English it was 
 necessary to terrorize the latter if possible, — and it 
 has not worked. Also, in spite of the reluctance 
 of the French, they have lately been following 
 England's sturdy lead. It has got to be done. 
 The curse will fall on the nation which began it — 
 Germany. 
 
 1 imagine that, when the cable carried the news 
 to you yesterday that, after a long freedom from 
 air raids, Paris had been seriously attacked 
 Wednesday night, and that the raid had lasted 
 well into Thursday morning, you little dreamed 
 that I had stood in my garden, and saw — or 
 rather heard — it all. But I did, and I can assure 
 you that it was an experience that I never expected 
 to have. 
 
 On Wednesday night I went to bed early. I 
 must have got to sleep about eleven. If I do not 
 sleep before midnight there is a strong possibility 
 of my not sleeping at all, — one of my old-age 
 habits. My first sleep is very sound. 
 
 I wakened suddenly with the impression that I 
 heard some one running along the terrace under 
 my window. I sat up and listened, half believing 
 that I had been dreaming, when I saw a ray of 
 light in the staircase — my door was open. . 
 
 I called out, " Qui est lh?" 
 
 Amelie's trembling voice replied, " Cest mot, 
 
 117
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Madame" and I had the sudden wide vision of 
 possibilities, which I am told is like that of a 
 drowning man, for I realized that she was not 
 coming to me in the middle of the night for 
 nothing, when she appeared in the doorway, all 
 dressed, even to her hood, and with a lighted 
 candle in her hand. 
 
 " Oh, Madame," she exclaimed, " you were 
 sleeping ? You heard nothing ? " And at that 
 moment I heard the cannon. " Oh, mon Dieu, 
 Madame, what is happening out at the front ? It 
 is something terrible, and you slept ! " 
 
 I listened. 
 
 " That is not at the front, Amelie," I exclaimed. 
 " It is much nearer, in the direction of Paris. 
 It's the guns of the forts." At that moment a 
 bomb exploded, and I knew at once. " It's the 
 Gothas, Amelie. Give me something to put on. 
 What time is it ? " 
 
 " Nearly midnight," she answered. 
 
 It took me less than ten minutes to. dress — it 
 was bitterly cold — and I wrapped myself in my 
 big military cloak, put a cap over my tumbled 
 hair, and a big fur round my neck, grabbed my 
 field glasses, and went out into the orchard, which 
 looks directly across the fort at Chelles in the 
 direction of Paris. 
 
 It was a beautiful night, cold and still, white 
 with moonlight, and the sky spangled with stars. 
 For three hours we stood there, — Pere and 
 Amelie and I,— listening to that bombardment, 
 seeing nothing — ignorant of what was going on. 
 The banging of the guns, the whirring of the 
 
 118 •
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 moteurs, the exploding of shells seemed over us 
 and around us — yet we could see nothing. It 
 only took us a little while to distinguish between 
 the booming of the guns at Chelles and Vauclure, 
 endeavouring to prevent the Gothas from passing, 
 by putting up barrage firing, and the more distant 
 bombs dropped by the flyers that had arrived 
 near or over the city. 
 
 It was all the more impressive because it was so 
 mysterious. At times it seemed as if one of three 
 things must have been happening — either that we 
 were destroying the fleet in the air, or they were 
 destroying us, or that Paris was being wiped out. 
 It did not, during those hours that I stood there, 
 seem possible that such a cannonading could be 
 kept up without one of these results. It was our 
 first experience, and I assure you that it was weird. 
 The beauty of the night, the invisibility of the 
 machines, our absolute ignorance of what was 
 going on, the humming of the moteurs overhead, 
 the infernal persistent firing of the cannon and the 
 terrific explosion of the bombs, followed, now and 
 then, by a dull glow in the west, was all so 
 mysterious. As the long minutes crept by, we 
 began to notice details, — for instance, that the air 
 battle moved in waves, and we easily understood 
 that meant several squadrons of German machines, 
 and we could finally, though we could see nothing 
 distinctly, realize by the firing that they ap- 
 proached, met the guns of the forts — passed over 
 or through the barrage curtain, or retired, and 
 tried again, then, having dropped their bombs, 
 swept more to the west, and gave place to another 
 
 119
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 attacking squadron. They seemed finally to retire 
 in the direction of Compiegne and Soissons, 
 pursued by gun fire from the forts. 
 
 It was four o'clock when we finally went into 
 the house, leaving silence under the stars and the 
 moonlit night. Amelie stirred up the embers, 
 threw on a little wood, put the screen around me, 
 made me a hot drink and I sat there to wait for 
 daybreak. It seemed strange to go out of doors 
 in the morning, and see nothing changed, after 
 such a night. 
 
 We waited impatiently for the morning papers. 
 They contained nothing but the mere fact that 
 Paris had been bombarded by Gothas. There 
 had been victims and damage, but in comparison 
 with the effort, the result had been unimportant. 
 Out of the twenty-eight German machines which 
 had taken part in the attack, only one had been 
 brought down — that fell near Vaires, not far from 
 Chelles. 
 
 This was our first experience of the sort, and I 
 could not help feeling puzzled that so much heavy 
 firing could go on, and out of twenty-eight 
 machines only one be touched. But that was 
 only my first impression. I knew when I came 
 to think it over that it was not easy in the night 
 to do more than try to keep the enemy off. The 
 more I thought it over the more ,1 became 
 convinced that up to now there is no very effective 
 way of preventing night air raids. 
 
 My letters which came this morning gave me 
 some details of the raid, saying enough to let me 
 guess what parts of the city were reached. They 
 
 120
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 penetrated as far as the Avenue de la Grande 
 Armee, and dropped bombs also in the vicinity of 
 the Halles, and the Gare de Lyons. Every one 
 writes that Paris is perfectly calm, although it is 
 evident that the Government — judging by the 
 rapidity with which it is preparing systematic 
 protection for its population — believes this to be 
 but the beginning of another desperate attempt to 
 break the morale of the country. 
 
 There are people at Voisins who claim to have 
 seen the Gotha that fell at Vaires. Perhaps they 
 did. I did not. 
 
 To-day has been a chilling day. This morning 
 we went on bread rations — one pound a day. It 
 is enough for me. 
 
 I have planted my climbing sweet peas. I 
 ought to have done it in October. I don't 
 know why I didn't, any more than I really know 
 why I bothered to-day. One must not let one's 
 self grow idle. 1 know that. But I hate having 
 life become mechanical. The strain is begining to 
 tell, and I hate to feel that. 
 
 121
 
 XVII 
 
 February 20, 1 918 
 
 Three weeks again. Sorry. 
 
 Mademoiselle Henriette is getting ready to 
 go to Salonique, where nurses are needed. Ever 
 since our ambulance closed she has been very- 
 restless, and it grows on her. She had been so 
 accustomed to wearing a uniform, with three years' 
 service brisques, on her left arm, and to feeling 
 herself a part of the great army of defence, 
 that to walk about in civilian clothes seems to 
 her stupid, and I don't wonder. 
 
 Her discontent culminated the other day, when 
 we had a very 'interesting cantonnement. The regi- 
 ment arrived at nine o'clock one evening, and 
 there was a military mass at the little church at 
 Quincy at nine the next morning. One of the 
 captains, a priest, and among the bravest men 
 in a brave regiment, preached a remarkable ser- 
 mon. Every one went, and of course the little 
 church was not a quarter big enough. The 
 soldiers knelt on the green in front of both 
 doors, and even in the road for the elevation. 
 It was a very touching sight. The regiment 
 had just come out of the firing line. 
 
 Poor Henriette, in her tailored dress and hat, 
 
 122
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 felt terribly out of it, — she who, a few months 
 ago, would have been kneeling among the soldiers 
 in her white coiffe^ with the red cross on her 
 forehead. She was near to tears when she re- 
 marked that no one in the regiment knew that 
 she, too, had given three years of her life to the 
 cause. So she must get back into the ranks, 
 and it looks like Salonique, — a hard post, but 
 it means sacrifice, and that is what she wants. 
 
 Thus far this month . the weather has been 
 delightful, and, though mornings and evenings 
 have been chilly, there have been many days 
 when I have not needed a fire, and be sure I 
 am grateful for that. 
 
 On St. Valentine's Day I went up to Paris 
 — just to change my ideas. I had not been 
 up since that terribly cold spell which ended 
 early in January. So I had not seen the city 
 since the big air raid. Every one had written 
 me details about the changed appearance of the 
 city — details as often comic as otherwise. I was 
 curious to see for myself. Curiosity killed a 
 cat, you know. 
 
 Well, there are changes, of course, but one 
 has rather to hunt for them. Everywhere — 
 if one looks for them — lame white cards are 
 hung on doorways. On them are printed in 
 large black letters the words " ABRIS — 60 per- 
 sonnes" or whatever number the cellars will 
 accommodate, and several of the underground 
 stations bear the same sort of sign. These are 
 refuges designated by the police, into which the 
 people near them are expected to descend at 
 
 123
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 the first sound of the sirenes announcing the 
 approach of the enemy's air fleet. 
 
 More striking than these signs are the rapid 
 efforts being made to protect some of the more 
 important of the city's monuments. They are 
 being boarded in, and concealed behind bags of 
 sand. You'd love to see it. Perhaps you have, 
 already, for I am sure that some enterprising 
 photographer is busy preserving the record. 
 Sandbags are dumped everywhere, and workmen 
 are feverishly hurrying to cover in the treasures, 
 and avoid making them look too hideous. They 
 would not be French if they did not try, here 
 and there, to preserve a fine line. 
 
 The most important group on the facade of 
 the Opera is thus concealed. You remember it, 
 — on the north-east corner — Carpeaux's " La 
 Danse." Of course you do, because don't you 
 remember we went and looked at it together at 
 the time Helene de Racowitza's suicide recalled 
 the woman who posed for the figure of Apollon 
 in the group — she who caused the duel in which 
 Ferdinand Lasalle was killed, and whose affair 
 with him inspired George Meredith's Tragic 
 Comedians. Poor Helene, I imagine she was 
 a much more feeble character than Meredith 
 drew her, but she was a beauty of the Third 
 Empire sort, and the shadow of great men fell 
 over her, and made her immortal as an idea, 
 although she outlived husbands, and lover, youth, 
 beauty, and prestige. Still, one cannot pity too 
 much the woman over whom a famous author 
 threw a mantle of greatness during her lifetime. 
 
 124
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 It was unfortunate that she could not have lived 
 up to it. She tried hard at the time that she 
 wrote Princesse et Comidienne, but the difficulty 
 was that in her memoirs she got herself terribly 
 mixed up with the literary portrait Meredith drew 
 of her. 
 
 The Rude group on the Arc de Triomphe, the 
 only real work of art in its ornamentation, has 
 also gone into retirement, and so have the doors 
 on the west front of Notre Dame, the famous 
 equestrian Louis XIV groups from Marly-le-Roi, 
 which adorn the entrance to the Champs-Elysees, 
 and the entrance to the Tuileries garden opposite. 
 The latter have funny little chalets built over 
 them. 
 
 You might think that rough work of this sort 
 would disfigure the city we love. But on my 
 word, it does not. I really believe I love it all 
 the better, — dear, menaced Paris. Perhaps it is 
 because it has been, and still is, in danger, that we 
 realize anew the immortal charm. I cannot put 
 into words just how I feel about it, but I imagine 
 you will understand. Every one of those 
 hoardings and all these sacks of sand seem like 
 italics to draw my attention to how dear it all is 
 to me. We are so prone to take the beauty we 
 find in life as a matter of course. 
 
 Possibly you, who have not seen Paris for four 
 years, might find more changes than I do, who 
 have watched it all the time. 
 
 I often wonder how it would look to you, who 
 only knew it in its better days. I have no way 
 to establish a standard. I have seen the change, 
 
 125
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 of course — but only little by little, and never 
 losing any of the charm. If it is really much 
 altered 1 don't know it. Just as one has to shake 
 one's self hard to realize the slow changes which 
 time brings to the faces of those whom we love, 
 so am I unconscious of the changes the war has 
 brought on Paris. I know that in some parts of the 
 city there are fewer people in the streets. I know 
 that in the centre of the city one finds still much 
 movement, though it has changed its character. 
 The soldiers of all nations have done that. To 
 me it has never looked more beautiful than it 
 does in these days. Its loveliness simply strikes 
 terror to my heart for fear of what might be, now 
 that the Germans are so desperate. 
 
 My visit was not altogether a peaceful one. 
 
 Perhaps I never told you that one of my Paris 
 friends, whenever she thinks I am staying away 
 from town too long, has a habit of writing to me, 
 and promising that if I will come up to town they 
 will try and arrange an air raid for me. I never 
 had happened to be there during one. She used 
 to say, " You really have seen so much, that it 
 would be a pity not to be in one of these raids 
 before the war ends." Of course, that was before 
 the attack of January. Since then, there has 
 been no need to arrange such a thing merely as 
 experience. I have had it. 
 
 All the same ; they brought it off on Sunday 
 night — the 17th. Thank you, I did not enjoy it 
 at all. It was an absolutely ineffective raid, as far 
 as doing any damage went. But we did not know 
 that while it was going on. I would not have 
 
 126
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 believed that so much noise could do so little 
 harm. 
 
 Of course the papers tell you how calm Paris 
 is. It is. But don't let that lead you to suppose 
 that an air raid is anything but a very nasty 
 experience. I imagine that very few people are 
 afraid of death to-day. Few as the air raids have 
 been, Parisians have already learned that the guns 
 for the defence make most of the no'ise. The 
 explosion of the bombs, if rarer, is a more terrible 
 sound. But what is hard to bear, is the certainty 
 that, although you are safe, some one else is not. 
 
 I suppose that if I don't tell you what we did 
 and how we passed the night, you'll ask me later, 
 and then I may have forgotten, or had first 
 impressions overlaid by other events. 
 
 Well, Sunday evening we had just gone to bed. 
 It was about ten o'clock. I was reading quietly 
 when I heard a far-ofF wailing sound. 1 knew 
 at once what it was. My hostess and I tumbled 
 out of our beds, unlatched the windows so that 
 no shock of air expansion might break them, 
 switched off all the lights and went on the balcony 
 just in time to see the firemen on their auto as they 
 passed the end of the street, sounding the " Gare 
 d vous " on their sirenes, — the most awful, hair- 
 raising wail I have ever heard — like a host of lost 
 souls. Ulysses need not have been tied to the 
 mast • to prevent his following the song of this 
 siren ! 
 
 We were hardly on the balcony, when, in an 
 instant, all the lights of the city went out, and a 
 strange blackness settled down and hugged the 
 
 127
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 housetops and the very sidewalk. At the same 
 instant the guns of the outer barrage began to fire, 
 and as the night was cold, we went inside to 
 listen, and to talk. 
 
 I wonder if I can tell you — who are never likely 
 to have such an experience — how it feels to sit 
 inside four walls, in absolute darkness, listening to 
 the booming of the defence, and the falling of 
 bombs on an otherwise silent city, wakened out of 
 its sleep. 
 
 It is a sensation to which I doubt if any of us 
 get really accustomed — this sitting quietly while 
 the cannon boom, and now and then an avion 
 whirs overhead, or a venturesome auto toots its 
 horn as it dashes to a shelter, or the occasional 
 voice of a gendarme yells angrily at some unex- 
 tinguished light, or a hurried footstep on the 
 pavement tells of a passer in the deserted street, 
 braving all risks to reach home. 
 
 I assure you that the hands on the clock-face 
 simply crawl. An hour is very long. This raid 
 of the 1 7th lasted only three-quarters of an hour. 
 It was barely half-past eleven when the berloque 
 sounded from the hurrying firemen's auto — the 
 B-flat bugle singing the "all clear," — and, in an 
 instant, the city was alive again, — noisily alive. 
 Even before the berloque was really audible in the 
 room where we sat, 1 heard the people hurrying 
 back from the abris, — doors opened and banged, 
 windows and shutters were flung wide, and the 
 rush of air in the gas pipes told that the city 
 lights were on again. 
 
 I don't find that the people are at all panic- 
 
 128
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 stricken. Every one hates it. But every one 
 knows that the chances are about one in some 
 thousands, — and takes the chance. I know of 
 late sitters-up, who cannot change their habits, 
 and who keep right on playing bridge during a 
 raid. How good a game it is I don't know. 
 Well, one kind of bravado is as good as another. 
 Among many people the chief sensation is one of 
 boredom — it is a nuisance to be wakened out of 
 one's first sleep ; it is a worse nuisance to have 
 proper saut de lit clothes ready; and it is the worst 
 nuisance of all to go down into a damp cellar and 
 possibly have to listen to talk. But, oh my ! what 
 a field for the farce-comedy writer of the days 
 after the war. It takes but little imagination to 
 conjure up the absurdities of such a situation that 
 the play-maker can combine in the days when 
 these times can be looked at from a comic point 
 of view. 
 
 I came back from town on the 18th. I found 
 everything quiet here. The only news is that my 
 hens are beginning to lay — but so are every one's. 
 While my hens did not lay, eggs went up to fifteen 
 cents apiece. To-day, when I get three dozen 
 a week, I can buy them, two for five cents. The 
 economics of farming get me. There must be 
 a way of making hens lay all the year round. It 
 is to be one of my jobs next year to learn the 
 trick. 
 
 K 
 
 129
 
 XVIII 
 
 March 9, 19 18 
 
 Well, we have been having some very droll 
 weather, and the weather is a safe topic, especially 
 when you seem to read between the lines of my 
 letters that I am getting demoralized, and at what 
 you choose to call an unnecessary moment, with 
 so many of " our boys " landing every week. 
 That's all right, but though they are here, they 
 are not ready, and there you are. 
 
 But weather ? 
 
 I told you that February was a very pretty 
 month. It often is in France. We had some 
 lovely nights, when I used to go out in the moon- 
 light, and look up in the starry dome and pick 
 out the constellations I knew. But I seemed the 
 only one here who enjoyed them. Every clear 
 night seemed to offer an open road to the Gothas. 
 It is a pity to live in a time when a lovely night 
 simply stands for a menace. As long as the 
 February moon lasted Amelie went home in a 
 nervous tremble every evening. She simply hates 
 the night attacks, although there is not the least 
 real danger here. 
 
 The thing that torments me is the feeling that 
 this aerial activity presages the German offensive. 
 We all know it is coming — our aeroplanes have 
 
 130
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 announced that the Germans are concentrating 
 their forces on our front — but when — where — on 
 that long line ? If any of them knows at head- 
 quarters, they are not, naturally, telling. 
 
 I am afraid that no one was sorry when, on the 
 i st, the snow began to fall. It lasted, off and 
 on, five days. Every night Amelie said, as she 
 closed the shutters, " Well, let us get a good 
 night's rest. The Gothas cannot go to Paris 
 to-night." When it ceased snowing, early Wed- 
 nesday morning, there was a foot on the ground. 
 But the sun came out, and by evening there was 
 no snow at all, and Amelie was sad again. 
 
 On Thursday — that was the 7th — I worked all 
 day in the garden, setting out rose-bushes, and 
 though it was a beautiful night, everything was 
 calm. But last night was a trying one. It began 
 earlier than the one in January, and it did not last 
 as long, but it was worse while it lasted. It was 
 only a little after nine o'clock, and I was on the 
 terrace, and the house was not shut up, when the 
 first gun of warning from the forts was fired. 
 Some one up the hill called, " What's that ? " and 
 another voice replied, "Paris." 
 
 I hurriedly closed my shutters, and put out the 
 lamp I had just lighted, and went into the garden 
 to watch and wait. 
 
 The battle of last night was quite different from 
 the previous ones. This time there were no aero- 
 planes in the air, except the Bodies'. The forts 
 in front of us — Chelles and Vaujours — not only 
 used their artillery to put up a barrage, they had 
 their searchlights on most of the time, and sent 
 
 131
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 up at intervals a series of fusies iclairantes — so 
 pretty as they followed one another in a line — 
 they were usually four in a series — and now and 
 then a rocket. It might have been fireworks — 
 only the Gothas went right over our heads in three 
 distinct waves, flying so low in an early evening, 
 not at all dark, that we frequently saw them, when 
 caught by the rockets or searchlights. We could 
 not be sure when they succeeded in passing, but 
 the explosion of bombs in Paris told that soon 
 enough, while the noise of the machines over our 
 heads told when they were actually turned back. 
 
 I must tell you an amusing thing. Amelie has 
 always insisted that she could tell a Boche machine 
 by the sound of its moteur. Perhaps she can. She 
 says always, " Listen, now ! Can't you hear that 
 Boche? His moteur grunts just like a pig" (of 
 course this is funnier and more significant in French 
 — comme un cochon)^ " but ours make music — they 
 sing ! " Pretty idea ? Well, the beauty of it is, 
 I repeated it to an aviator the other day as a joke. 
 He looked at me seriously and replied, " But it 
 is absolutely true." Evidently I am sometimes 
 stone deaf. 
 
 It was midnight when I came in, and that is 
 how it happens that I am writing to you very early 
 in the morning — just daybreak, because, I sud- 
 denly decided, in a sleepless night, that I needed 
 a change of scene. The only one available is to 
 go to Paris, and talk it over in English instead 
 of French. So I am sending these few words for 
 fear that if I am detained longer than 1 plan — and 
 in these days one never knows what may happen — 
 
 132
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 there will not be again too long a lapse in my 
 letters. 
 
 Oh, I really must mention the British going to 
 Jericho, or you will think that I have my eyes so 
 fixed on local things that even my mental vision 
 cannot look over the horizon line. Nice idea, 
 isn't it — the Australian cavalry riding into Jericho ? 
 We've wished Jericho on so many people in our 
 time that it is comforting to think that, finally, 
 some one has really gone there — and history has 
 recorded it. 
 
 133
 
 XIX 
 
 March 17, 191 8 
 
 Your letter just received remarks that I seem 
 to do a deal of " gadding " in these days. Well, 
 I told you in my last that I was going again, and 
 I did. I went the day I wrote to you, — that was 
 the 9th, and came back day before yesterday. 
 Apparently I must have forgotten to tell you that, 
 after all these months, the Commander of the 
 Fifth Army Corps had decided to give me apermis 
 de circuler good for three months. That is how 
 it happens that 1 can " gad," as you call it. I am 
 afraid that you cannot realize just what it means 
 after years of such restrictions as I had to support, 
 to be free to move without explaining each time, 
 fixing the date a fortnight in advance, and then 
 waiting in uncertainty as to whether the simple 
 request would be granted or not. It inspires 
 one to move on a bit, when it is not absolutely 
 necessary, just for the joy of feeling free. 
 
 On the way down the hill to Couilly on Satur- 
 day, the day I left, we met the 89th Infantry 
 marching in from Lagny, where they had been 
 resting for some weeks, to canton on our hill, and 
 I was half sorry that I was leaving, especially as 
 air raids are of almost nightly recurrence, and 
 Amelie, who hates them, worries when I am away. 
 
 J 34
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 It is useless for me to explain to her that in town 
 I stay in a part of the city which is practically safe 
 — well to the south-west, in an apartment on the 
 second floor of a six-storey building. Bombs which 
 fall on a house rarely go through more than three 
 storeys, and those that burst in the street seldom 
 damage above the first floor. Amelie is always, 
 in these days, looking for the surprising and the 
 unexpected. I fancy she would feel happier if 
 she could be assured that at the first sound of the 
 alerte I would make for an abri with an electric 
 lamp in my pocket, a camp-stool in one hand, a 
 shovel in the other and a pickaxe over my shoulder. 
 Then there should be a maid behind, with a 
 bucket of water, a boule chaude, a flask of cognac, 
 a cushion for my back, and a rug for my knees — 
 in fact, " all the comforts of home." But she 
 knows that I would much prefer to be killed out- 
 right than suffocated in a cave. 
 
 As I had anything but a comfortable time at 
 home the night before I left, I really could not see 
 what difference it made where I was. One side 
 of the tir de barrage seemed to me as good as the 
 other, though 1 will confess that I prefer to listen 
 out of doors, in the air, than shut up in a room, 
 even when honours are easy as to danger. 
 
 The last words Amelie said to me were, " I do 
 hope the Gothas won't go to Paris with you this 
 time." But they did. 
 
 However, I had a good night Saturday, and 
 passed a quiet Sunday, resting in a cosy room, 
 free from any responsibility, and talking about 
 anything that was not war, and I enjoyed it. But 
 
 135
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 I paid up for it that night, when, just as I was 
 getting into bed, that abominable sirene went wail- 
 ing through the street, and almost at the same 
 moment the bombs began to fall. This was even 
 before we heard the barrage, and then, for three 
 long hours and more, the cannon boomed, the 
 machine guns spat, and the bombs exploded. It 
 was a simply infernal racket. 
 
 If you want an example of how some of the 
 simple people take it, here is one. The bonne in 
 the house where I visit is a girl from Nimes, who 
 used to live in a convent. Needless to say she is 
 very religious. She has no sense of fear. Per- 
 haps she does not know enough to be afraid — 
 maybe I wrong her. She sleeps in the top of the 
 house. The only thing she, who loves her bed, 
 hates, is being waked up. Her orders are to come 
 downstairs when the alerte begins. But she rarely 
 does. On that night, for some reason, possibly 
 because there was a bad fire, she came down. The 
 house was chilly, so she was told to lie on the sofa 
 in the dining-room. She obeyed, and fell asleep 
 at once, and peacefully slept right through it all. 
 
 When it was over I went to the door and called 
 her, told her that it was over, and that she could 
 go up to bed. 
 
 She rose, sleepily, looking a bit dazed, and then 
 said : " Is it over, Madame ? " Then she piously 
 blessed herself, and in a hurried voice, just as you 
 have heard people murmur their prayers sotto voce y 
 she added, " God pity those less lucky than we 
 have been," and went back to bed. I am positive 
 that she was asleep in five minutes, and as I already 
 
 136
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 know those who claim to have slept through raids 
 it may be possible that I am wrong about people 
 not becoming accustomed to them, and that, if 
 they go on frequently, we may all sleep right 
 through. 
 
 I suppose that you know that the Government 
 conceals, as far as possible, all the damage done 
 by these air raids. The newspapers give no 
 details. The part of the city damaged is never 
 mentioned. The official announcement contains 
 merely the fact that the raid began at a certain 
 hour, that there was or was not material damage 
 done, when it ended, and whether or not there 
 were victims. Of course the people in the vicinity 
 hit by the bombs know, and the muzzled news- 
 papers know, but you would be surprised at the 
 small excitement there is. The object of the 
 silence is, of course, to conceal from Germany the 
 result of these raids. I've my doubts if that is 
 possible. It seems to me that nothing can be con- 
 cealed from them. I'm not sure that, in some 
 diabolical way, they don't know what I am writing 
 to you this very minute. But if the reticence does 
 not achieve that object, it proves very effective in 
 circumscribing excitement, which, under the old 
 reporting methods, would have been inevitable, 
 and the effects of the raid do not become the one 
 topic of the day's conversation in the streets. 
 This raid was an especially disastrous one, as there 
 was a fire in an important part of the city. Yet 
 it was only by the merest accident that, forty-eight 
 hours later, I passed through the famous quarter 
 which was most damaged, and although it was 
 
 137
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 wonderfully cleaned up — the fire department goes 
 to work at once, and even daylight which follows 
 the raid finds many traces removed — it seemed to 
 me that for half a mile on both sides of the Boule- 
 vard St. Germain, where it runs between the 
 Government buildings, there was not a whole pane 
 of glass — yet there was no irreparable harm done, 
 and the loss of life was not heavy. 
 
 Amelie met me at the station when 1 came 
 home, in a very nervous frame of mind. She 
 literally yanked me out of the train, and said 
 emphatically : " Well, thank God, here you are. 
 You are not going to Paris again until these 
 raids are over. It makes us all too nervous. 
 You are better off at home." 
 
 When 1 got up the hill and saw what had 
 happened here 1 did not blame her for being 
 nervous, although I confess that I could not see 
 that one place was any improvement on the other. 
 Thirty bombs and a torpedo or two had been 
 sprinkled along the valley from Vaires to Crecy- 
 en-Brie. A big bomb fell in the field on the 
 other side of the route nationale, and made a hole 
 fifteen yards square and nine yards deep. Five 
 bombs fell on Bouleurs, and a torpedo, which did 
 not explode, fell the other side of Quincy in what 
 is called the " terre noire." The bomb which fell 
 near the chateau shook the whole hill, and it was 
 quite evident that it had shaken Amelie's nerves, 
 and that she had not recovered. 
 
 The result is that there is a general fit of 
 trembling everywhere, and it is the fashion here 
 to sleep in the caves. There is a machine gun 
 
 >3»
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 set up at the Demi-Lune, the water-mains on the 
 top of the hill — the Paris water from the Ourcq 
 passes there — have been examined, as have our 
 local mains — Couilly has running water — and 
 hose attached. The firemen, of whom I have 
 never heard before, have materialized. All this 
 active preparation for a local defence ought to 
 calm the people, but, of course, it does not. It 
 only emphasizes the fact that it is necessary, and 
 to them, waiting so long in suspense for the 
 beginning of a spring action, seems to presage 
 hard days. 
 
 There have always been rigid rules about lights 
 here from the first air raids, so long ago. They 
 have been forgotten, with the result that thirty 
 people were fined to-day for uncovered lights, and 
 the rules are made more rigid than ever. I have 
 been notified that my shutters are not sufficient, 
 and have to hustle to get some sort of heavy 
 inside curtains for a house which at this moment 
 seems all doors and windows. The truth is, the 
 part of my house where the lights show is the guest 
 chamber, never used except when the soldiers are 
 here, as they are now. 
 
 All circulation in the roads after dark is for- 
 bidden. Wagons cannot carry lights, nor foot- 
 passengers lanterns. It has been the habit for 
 people from Couilly to come running up the hill, 
 lantern in hand, to watch the raids on Paris from 
 here, and there is a theory that it was these 
 lanterns on the road which drew the bombs on 
 the hill Sunday. It may be, but as there was 
 a big cantonnement of troops here that seems a 
 
 139
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 better explanation, while it is not unlikely that 
 some of the Gothas which failed to get through 
 the barrage^ not wishing to return to their base 
 carrying their bombs with them, may simply have 
 dropped them any old place. All these things 
 are guesses, of course. 
 
 The weather is lovely. I am getting a lot of 
 work done in my garden — among other things, 
 sand laid in all the paths — after trying for four 
 years. The poilus did it for me. It will make life 
 much easier, as I can walk in the garden in winter. 
 It will also be a comfort to Amelie, as I shall not 
 track in the mud, and neither will Khaki and 
 Dick. 
 
 140
 
 XX 
 
 March 28, 191 8 
 
 Can it be less than a fortnight ago that I wrote 
 to you ? My letter-book says so, but it is hard 
 to believe. I seem to have lived a century 
 since. 
 
 The cables have told you the mere facts, of 
 course. You know that the long-expected 
 offensive presaged by the concentration of the 
 German hordes from the Russian frontier began 
 on the 2 1 st, when they were flung against our 
 lines, from Cherizy in the north to Panisiaux Bois 
 in the south, and that, in six days, the Allies have 
 lost all their hard-earned advances of three years. 
 In six days all the sacrifices of three years have 
 been rendered vain, and last night our line was 
 sixty miles, in some places, west of where it had 
 been on the morning of March 21st. In the lost 
 land are the scenes of so much hard righting, 
 land over which the Allies had crept inch by inch — 
 all lost in six days — Peronne, Bapaume, Ham, 
 Roye, Noyon and oh ! how many tragic hilltops, 
 and how many spots where our beloved dead lie 
 buried 1 
 
 But even though you read these things, you 
 have no idea of what the week has meant to us 
 living so near it, to us, who, day after day, have 
 
 141
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 followed the brave boys in the advance, and felt, 
 as they felt, that no inch of ground gained could 
 be lost again. 
 
 The hours of those first days will always be 
 unforgettable hours of tragedy. I have many 
 times written of the dread we have felt of some 
 such thing ever since the Germans were in a 
 position to remove their defensive army from the 
 east. But never, in my greatest anxiety, did I 
 dream of this. 
 
 March 2 1st was a beautiful Thursday. 
 
 Louise and I were working in the garden. I 
 was setting out pansies in the bed under the 
 elderberry bushes, on the side of the hill. 
 
 It was during the morning that I began to hear 
 far-off guns, but I took little notice, until after 
 noon, when the booming became so heavy that 
 the very ground in which I had my hands seemed 
 to tremble under me — or was it my hands that 
 were trembling ? I don't know. 
 
 It lasted all day, and the guns were still 
 thundering when I went out on the lawn before 
 going up to bed — to look ofT to the north. 
 
 At intervals I heard it all night, and once, in 
 the night, I went out to look and could see the 
 lights in the sky, and now and then a rocket. I 
 heard the voices of Pere and Amelie, and knew 
 that they were hanging out of their window, 
 watching the north also. 
 
 I cannot tell you what the sleepless suspense, 
 and the waiting for the morning was like. I was 
 still in bed, waiting for Amelie to arrive on the 
 morning of the 22nd, when I heard some one 
 
 142
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 running along the terrace, and a voice called : 
 " Vous etes eveillee^ Madame ? " 
 
 I went to the window. 
 
 There stood my next-door neighbour, white as 
 a sheet. 
 
 " Oh, Madame," she cried, " the Germans have 
 attacked our line on a front of ninety kilometres. 
 We are retreating on the whole line. My God, 
 my God ! ' And she went on down the hill to 
 carry the news to Voisins. 
 
 Even while I was standing, stupefied, I heard 
 the drums beating the assemblage ginirale in 
 Voisins, for the 89th Infantry are still with us. 
 
 By the time I was dressed the boys were coming 
 in relays to say "good-bye," and to announce 
 that the camions were coming at eleven. 
 
 The morning was a repetition of that of last 
 spring, when the 11 8th advanced to Soissons. 
 
 It was impossible to work. No one could. 
 It was just after noon that the camions began to 
 arrive. 
 
 As the trees are not yet leaved out, I could see, 
 from the lawn, the long line of grey camions drawn 
 up at equal spaces from each other all along the 
 route to Meaux, and, at intervals, the soldiers, sac 
 an doSy standing in groups ready to mount to 
 their places. 
 
 It was two o'clock when they began to move, 
 and from that time, night and day, until Sunday 
 morning of the 24th, the line of advancing troops, 
 cannon, artillery, field-kitchens — was absolutely 
 unbroken. They occupied all the roads about 
 us, even that on the canal. Along the route 
 
 *43
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 nationale and the route du canal of Meaux they 
 moved, rumbling at top speed, about ten yards 
 apart, and along the route towards Esbly, through 
 Conde, wound all the horse-drawn vehicles and 
 the cavalry. Overhead hummed the aeroplanes, 
 keeping watch. 
 
 Every day the news that came was bad. Every 
 day the Allies were being driven back, and last 
 night they were within twelve miles of Amiens, 
 already evacuated. 
 
 To make the whole situation sadder, by Sunday 
 night the refugees, driven for the second time 
 from their homes, began to pass through over all 
 our routes. That is what brings panic. It would 
 carry it as far as Paris, if Paris had to see it, but 
 in the city the movement is concentrated about 
 the Gare du Nord, and the Gare de l'Est, and 
 there the organization is wonderful. In the 
 entire evacuation I am told that the American 
 boys are doing heroic work. 
 
 All the week I have fought against panic here. 
 Faith, you understand, I am sure, had received a 
 hard blow. Fear seemed suddenly to have taken 
 root everywhere, a thing I have never seen here 
 before — fear that the Germans were too strong 
 in numbers still, and the Americans not only 
 unprepared, but not yet numerous enough to turn 
 the balance, for in the first few days before Amiens 
 the Allies fought, at times, one to six, and some 
 say, at an even greater disadvantage. 
 
 To make the situation all the harder for the 
 civilians — for they had to get hold of their nerves, 
 and they did it — the Germans threw all their 
 
 144
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 resources against us at once, not only at the front 
 against the armies, but against the civilians in the 
 rear ; it was the very exaggeration of their war- 
 fare of terror. 
 
 On Saturday morning, the third day of the 
 battle — at about half-past seven — as 1 was sitting in 
 the garden listening to the guns, I heard an ex- 
 plosion in the direction of Paris, and, while I was 
 wondering what it could mean, the church bells all 
 along the valley began to ring out an alerte. I had 
 not heard a sound even resembling a moteur in the 
 air and the sound from Paris was not in the least 
 like that made familiar by the air raids. Besides, 
 the Germans have never attempted an air raid by 
 daylight, although the English have. It could 
 not have been more than a half-hour later that 
 there was another sound exactly like the first in 
 the same direction. But this time there was no 
 alerte > and there was no noise of the guns for the 
 defence of the city against avions. At regular 
 intervals all day, while we read the trying news 
 from the front — eighty divisions of German 
 soldiers thrown against the British — we heard 
 that sound from Paris repeated. 
 
 About half-past four in the afternoon Amelie's 
 nephew, a lad of sixteen, who works in an am- 
 munition place, arrived from Paris — his train over 
 an hour and a half late — with the news that Paris 
 was being bombarded from the air — that the 
 attack began a little after seven — that there had 
 been no alerte until after the bombardment began, 
 and that, up to the time he left, no German avions 
 had been heard by the listening posts anywhere, 
 
 L I 4 5
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 and yet once in about fifteen minutes a bomb 
 fell. 
 
 That was all very mysterious. 
 
 I asked him if much damage had been done, 
 and if there was any panic. 
 
 He said he had heard that several people had 
 been killed, but there was no panic. When the 
 sirenes went through the streets after the first bomb, 
 people ran, as usual, for the abris^ but as silence 
 followed they gradually came out into the streets, 
 and stood about, gazing up into the air. No sign 
 of any air machine — any Boche — had been seen. 
 When the lad left Paris there was a spirit of 
 curiosity rather than alarm, and the only harm he 
 had actually seen was a newspaper kiosk, near the 
 railway station, destroyed, and a hole in the 
 ground. That looked serious enough, considering 
 the situation. But " a miss is as good as a mile." 
 
 The next day, Sunday — a day too beautiful to ' 
 look on such horrid deeds — we got the explana- 
 tion. It seemed inconceivable, but it is evidently 
 true. The latest war exploit of the Huns is a 
 gun set up — so the aviators say — somewhere near 
 La Fere, where the Yorkshire boys fought their 
 last battle before retreating here in September, 
 1 9 14 — a gun which is bombarding Paris at a 
 distance variously stated at from sixty-five to 
 eighty miles — either distance seems equally in- 
 credible, but it is evidently true. The military 
 authorities are said to have it placed. The ques- 
 tion is to destroy it. But you probably heard all 
 about this by cable. 
 
 The son of one of my neighbours who is at 
 
 146
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 home on leave — he is an aviator to-day; he was a 
 farmer in 19 14 — said, as we were listening to this 
 gun yesterday, for it is still at work : 
 
 " Madame, this is war. If we want to win, we 
 have got to get rid of all our civilian ideas. If 
 nations do not want to put up with things of this 
 sort, why, they must find another way than war 
 to settle their disputes. No one would be in the 
 least sentimental about killing a tiger and its 
 whelps. Why pretend to a finer feeling about an 
 enemy more dangerous than a tiger — an enemy 
 so dangerous that even when we get him down — 
 and we shall — I don't see how the world can go 
 on unless we exterminate him, even if it takes 
 this generation. If we, stupidly, do not, then we 
 must suffer for it later. Be sure of one thing, if 
 the Boches get us down, they'll wipe us out. 
 The whole earth is not big enough for both 
 
 us. 
 
 Anyway, there is a point of view for you. 
 
 On the fourth day of the bombardment of 
 Paris, while every one was divided between 
 anxiety about the battle in the north and pride 
 at the superb spirit of desperate resistance of our 
 armies, I got a letter from Paris which gave us 
 all a good laugh — for I translated for Amelie, 
 knowing that she would tell it everywhere — and 
 better it in the telling. It spoke of the splendid 
 spirit of the bombarded capital, which had already 
 returned to normal life — tramways running, 
 street-life calm, school-children in the radius of 
 the bombardment being taken out of danger ; 
 and it told of the first effort to announce the 
 
 H7
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 beginning of the daily bombardment by an alerte 
 to be given by the city police, who were ordered 
 to beat a drum in the streets — a sort of city 
 revival of our country town crier. The Sergent 
 de Ville, who has his amour propre, protested. 
 He did not know how to drum — drumming is a 
 mi tier like any other. The city replied, " Never 
 mind that. Put the drum on. Take these two 
 sticks, and go along pounding. We've no time 
 to give you lessons. Every one will know what 
 it means." 
 
 They were properly humiliated, but they had to 
 obey. Away they had to go, beating their drums, 
 and beside them marched the gamins of Paris, 
 pounding on tin cans, and whatever would make a 
 noise. Of course all Paris roared with laughter. 
 The blushing Sergents de Ville returned to their 
 posts, and they never went out any more as drum- 
 mers. Isn't that deliciously Paris ? Too bad 
 Mr. Hohenzollern could not have seen it. 
 
 But though this made a short diversion here 
 we did not laugh long. Yesterday it looked 
 dangerously like a panic again. For a few hours 
 it seemed as if all our efforts could not prevent 
 people here from evacuating the place — without 
 orders. If the news had not been better this morn- 
 ing 1 hate to think what might have happened. 
 
 Last night we heard no guns. This morning's 
 communique announced that the German advance 
 has been practically stopped — at all events the 
 Allies are holding them — the breaches in the line 
 have been filled — it is unbroken — but after a 
 retreat of nearly sixty miles, and all they have 
 
 148
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 worked for and won inch by inch, lost from Noyon 
 north, except a bit of Flanders. 
 
 It is a sin to look back, I know. Our road 
 lies in the future. I hope no one over there 
 whom I love will ever have to fight depression as 
 I have fought it since a week ago to-day. I 
 suppose the turn of you across the water is 
 coming. Still, you will never have to see poor 
 women and little children flying from their homes, 
 as we see them every day. They never complain. 
 They are grateful for the slightest sympathy. 
 They invariably tell you of cases they know of 
 people so much worse off than they are. 
 
 I hope you are not worrying about me. I 
 could not write you all these details if I did not 
 know — was not sure — that long before you read 
 it, the situation will be changed for the better, 
 that the cable will have reassured you, so that all 
 this will only be interesting to you, who want to 
 know always the truth about my life. 
 
 They tell us at the Mairie that, while the 
 Boches may advance a little at one point or another 
 in the line, the push is absolutely over, and that 
 it has been out of all proportion costly for the 
 Germans. With that we have to be content. 
 We must wait for history to tell us of the glorious 
 episodes of the desperate battles, of the achieve- 
 ments of the cavalry which closed the breaches in 
 the line, and how the French 5th Army Corps — 
 our brave boys of the Seine and Marne — held 
 the road down the valley of the Oise to the 
 beating heart of France — Paris — for the second 
 time. How long ? 
 
 149
 
 XXI 
 
 April 15, 1918 
 
 We are droll, we humans. 
 
 Although the battle is still going on out there 
 every one here seems to have forgotten those 
 panicky hours of the last week in March. It was 
 that first quick retreat in the north which upset 
 them all with the unspeakable dread that perhaps 
 we could not hold them. The moment when it 
 became evident that, though the Allies had to 
 retreat, the line was not smashed, every one bucked 
 up — and life became just what it had been all 
 these forty-two and a half months before. People 
 seem even to have forgotten the dread of those 
 days. 
 
 The second phase of the battle was over a week 
 ago, and, though we have lost some ground, the 
 line is still an unbroken wall, and Germany's 
 situation unchanged — except that she is a little 
 nearer Paris. 
 
 We've had some queer weather — most uncertain. 
 It has rained, sunshined, -snowed, sunshined and 
 frozen. I am afraid that means another year 
 without fruit, which is a disappointment, as the 
 fruit trees flowered superbly. 
 
 The long-distance cannon continues to fire on 
 Paris — the grosse Bertha, they call it. We hear 
 
 150
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 every shot from here. The cannon at the front 
 still pounds away, and during the nights the 
 battle-front is often strangely illuminated, a dull 
 glow, like that which 1 am sure you have often 
 seen in the sky over a foundry, and not unlike 
 that which, at times, hangs over Vesuvius. Now 
 and then we see star rockets and different kinds 
 of fusees. But I no longer go out at night to 
 watch, though I cannot induce Pere and Amelie 
 to sleep. The truth is that I have got so that 
 the cannon do not keep me awake. Amelie insists 
 that she cannot sleep, but as her room is on the 
 south side of the house, I believe that is only 
 because she persists in getting up and hanging 
 out of the north window to see what is going on, 
 thus deliberately preventing herself from sleeping. 
 
 I keep myself very busy. It is the only way. 
 I go up to Paris whenever there is any need, 
 much to Amelie's disgust. She never draws a 
 long breath, she says, until I get back, on the 
 theory that a bomb from that long-range gun will 
 fall on the train one day, or on me in the street. 
 But as the chances are about one in a million I'll 
 take that chance. 1 was in Paris three times last 
 week — going up twice by the seven-o'clock train, 
 and coming back at night. Of course, only 
 important business would have induced me to 
 make that effort, as it meant taking my coffee at 
 half-past five, and I don't like that any better than 
 I ever did. 
 
 In spite of everything I had heard, I found 
 Paris normal. It is a very great pity that the 
 Germans, who are told that Paris is being 
 
 *5*
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 bombarded every day, and probably suppose it is 
 being gradually destroyed, cannot see the effects 
 of the bombardment. I was on the boulevards 
 the first day I went up, when a bomb fell and 
 exploded, making so heavy a detonation that it 
 seemed very near. It really was across the Seine. 
 No one stopped walking, though every one did 
 exactly what I did — pulled out a watch to see the 
 hour. That was all, though it was only a short 
 time after the Good Friday feat of the grosse 
 Bertha^ when a bomb fell on the church you and 
 I know so well, and where we used to go in the 
 old days, and sitting near the tomb of Madame 
 de Maintenon's ribald first husband — chair-bound 
 old Scarron — listen to the very service that was 
 going on when the bomb fell. What with the 
 bomb, and the panic that followed, there was 
 heavy loss of life, and because of the number of 
 victims, and the fact that many were well-known 
 people, — for the Good Friday office of the Tene- 
 brae is a smart religious function,— the accident 
 made a good deal of noise in the world, and it 
 was impossible to conceal it. But it is ridiculous 
 to emphasize the fact that the dirty Germans 
 deliberately fired on a church on a Holy Day 
 during an office, as the reaching of such a target 
 was pure accident. The emplacement of the big 
 gun is fixed. It reaches a certain distance into 
 the city. It can evidently be turned east and 
 west, so that the menaced points seem to lie in 
 an arc, reaching roughly from Montrouge to near 
 the Gare de l'Est, and passing by a line just 
 behind where I used to live — through the " Garden 
 
 152
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 of Lies," I imagine — and across the Seine near 
 the Louvre. 
 
 Twice while I was in Paris I had to pass through 
 this line, while the gun was firing, to go out 
 through the fortifications. I was on my way to 
 a suburban hospital, and had a sick woman in the 
 motor-car. The big gun fired a corking shot 
 while we were crossing the Seine to run up by 
 the Luxembourg Gardens. I looked at my .watch 
 and calculated the distance to the Porte, but I 
 had not the smallest sensation of the suspense I 
 expected to have. Three hours later I came 
 back by the same route, only making a slight 
 detour to avoid a tree that a shot fired since I 
 passed out of the gate had broken off". 
 
 The only marked difference that I saw in the 
 quarter was the silence in the Luxembourg 
 Gardens, where the children were no longer 
 playing. Apropos of the children, you might 
 suppose that living in a bombarded city, being in 
 so many cases taken out of bed and carried to 
 abris in the night, might at least create a panic 
 among them. It does not seem to. On the 
 contrary many of them appear to think it all a 
 lark. 
 
 In the danger zone, of course, Paris, which 
 takes great care of her children — for nowhere are 
 children more loved or happier than they are in 
 France — has sent the school-children, with their 
 teachers, into the country. But there are still 
 plenty of children in the city. 
 
 One day when I was in town I saw a group of 
 youngsters playing and making so much noise 
 
 153
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 that 1 had to stop and watch them. It was in a 
 garden in a safe part of the city, and it took two 
 minutes to see what they were playing. They 
 were playing " Les Gothas." One boy was a 
 watcher at a " listening post," who gave the 
 alarm, " They come ! ' Another was the fireman 
 in his auto, rushing along, and sounding his 
 sirene. One was the gunner at his post of D. C. A. 
 putting up a barrage, " bang, bang, bang." A 
 group were Boche avions making a terrible series 
 of explosions in all parts of the garden. When 
 it was over, the bogus dead and wounded were 
 lying all over the place, and a tiny little fellow 
 rushed about, sounding the " All clear " on a tin 
 trumpet. Even then it was not over, for along 
 came the clanging bells of the ambulances and the 
 victims were picked up. They did the thing 
 with great spirit, imitating all the noises admirably, 
 with children's apt talent at mimicry. 
 
 I never go to Paris but I wish that you were 
 with me. Each trip into the city has its new 
 experience. 
 
 The railway station is one of the most interesting 
 places in the world to-day. Our line carries 
 most of the soldiers going to and from the 
 front. 
 
 At Vaires, just outside of the outer line of 
 forts, is the immense Camp des Permissionaires. 
 All the men coming in from the front on their 
 regular eight days' home-leave once in four 
 months, must stop at Vaires to have their papers 
 examined, and from there go on to their destina- 
 tions, and many of them stay there during their 
 
 154
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 leave, for obvious reasons. At the expiration of 
 their leave, they report there to be sent back to 
 their posts. The camp is immense. Line after 
 line of tracks has been laid, extending almost as 
 far as one can see, for the big military trains run 
 right into the camp from the main line. Miles 
 and miles of barracks, and offices for re-equipping 
 soldiers, stretch off into the distance, and there is 
 never an hour of the day or night when a train- 
 load of poilus is not coming in or going out. 
 
 As this is only a short distance down the line 
 between here and Paris it is one of the most 
 interesting points on my trips to town. 
 
 The big station in Paris, with its various Red 
 Cross works — the Americans have a very well- 
 organized one there — and moving throngs, is 
 even more interesting. It is alive with movement 
 — with tragedy and comedy — and to-day it is a 
 tower of Babel, with the American military 
 policeman in his red bands and his conspicuous 
 U. S. A. always in evidence. 
 
 I never can resist lingering a minute to see the 
 soldiers leaving the station. There are always 
 crowds of women and children waiting at the 
 barriers — for the poilus have their especial entrance 
 and exit — and a throng always presses round the 
 gate through which they must pass, not only those 
 who have come expecting — usually in vain — to 
 meet their own, — but the curious who have just 
 come to see the boys from the front. The looker 
 after material — artistic, realistic, or otherwise — 
 lovers of the grotesque, hunters after the 
 picturesque, lovers of laughter, morbid seekers 
 
 *55
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 after tragedy, will find it all there, as well as, now 
 and then, something of the beautiful, and 
 occasionally a bit of the heroic. But the seeker 
 after what is ordinarily known as " scenes " will 
 lose his time. France may have once been what 
 we used to call her, " hysterical." She is certainly 
 not even emotional to-day, so far as I can see. 
 
 Sometimes I think that the big station is even 
 more picturesque on the side where the poilus are 
 waiting to go back. At those times the big 
 courtyard in front is packed with them. When 
 they are coming in from the front, they simply 
 seem to rush through, taking little notice of the 
 crowd so interested in them and providing the 
 atmosphere involuntarily. But when they are 
 going back to the front it is a different matter. 
 
 Do you find that puzzling ? Well, the poilus 
 arriving on home-leave are tired, often disgusted, 
 or indifferent. " Home-leave " looks like Heaven 
 to them. But they go back gaily. The truth is, 
 as a rule, they are glad to go back. It is not that 
 they are not tired of the war. They are. Every 
 one is — except our boys, who are nearly four 
 years behind the game. It has lasted too long 
 for the poilu to have anything but dogged toler- 
 ance for it. When the regular time arrives for 
 him to " come out " he welcomes it, but in the 
 three and more years that he has been cut off 
 from normal life he has become the inhabitant of 
 another world. He speaks another language — 
 a specialized tongue — and, in spite of everything, 
 he almost invariably gets homesick on leave. 
 
 I suspected this, little by little, as I watched 
 
 i 5 6
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 the men coming in from the front — they are no 
 longer boisterous — and then watched them go 
 singing back. So one day I said to Petit Louis, 
 a boy in our commune^ a gunner, who always 
 comes to pay his respects to me when he arrives 
 on leave, and to say " good-bye " when " going 
 in " again. 
 
 " Well, Louis, how is your soixante-quinze ? ' 
 
 " Fine, the darling," he laughed. 
 
 Then I said that I supposed he was glad to be 
 at home. 
 
 He puckered up his brows, shrugged his 
 shoulders, made one of his queer little gestures 
 with his hands, and said : 
 
 " Well, I don't know. Sure, I am glad to see 
 the woman and the kids, and to sleep one night 
 or so in a bed — but — I don't know why it is, I 
 get bored with it in a day or two. I am used to 
 a different kind of life. I miss my chums. I 
 miss knowing exactly what to do — what I've got 
 to do whether I want to or not. So you see, 
 after two days of walking about, talking with 
 people who seem to understand just nothing at all 
 about what is going on out there, I am bored. I 
 miss being dead tired at night. I miss the noise. 
 After two or three days I count the hours until 
 I can get back." 
 
 I can understand that. It made me think of 
 what a man said to me in Paris in the early days 
 of the war. 
 
 " My father used to go, once a year, to sit over 
 a dinner with his comrades of the regiment in '70. 
 My sons will cherish their comrades and live over 
 
 157
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 with them this great war. Men of my generation 
 — we have nothing to talk about." 
 
 It was not worth while to remind him that 
 after this is over the men who will be heard 
 talking loudest will be those who have never seen 
 a trench or fired a gun. Here in our little 
 commune the people who can tell you the wildest 
 tales of the days of the invasion are those who 
 ran away. If any one were to come here to-day, 
 in a spirit of research, it would not be the half- 
 dozen of us who actually stayed here in September, 
 1 9 14, who would tell hair-raising tales. It would 
 be the others. The stories have rolled up like 
 the famous snowball. It has opened my eyes 
 in a sense about the difficulties of writing 
 history. 
 
 One of the striking features about this war is 
 that the active soldiers almost never talk with the 
 civilians about the war. In a sense, it is for- 
 bidden, but the reason goes deeper than that. 
 The soldier and the civilian seem to-day to speak 
 a different language. It almost seems as if a dark 
 curtain hung between the realities of life " out 
 there," and the life into which the soldier enters 
 en repos. 
 
 Whenever they are talkative, it is of something 
 rather spiritual than material. The last time I 
 went up to Paris I had an experience of that sort. 
 I was settled in my compartment — alone. The 
 train was about to start when the door was yanked 
 open. A tall, middle-aged officer brought up 
 his hand to salute, flung his bag in, entered after 
 it, banged the door, and sat down just as the train 
 
 158
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 moved. He cast a keen glance at me, then 
 unbuckled his belt and made himself comfortable. 
 The first time he caught my eyes he leaned over, 
 and said : 
 
 " I imagine that you are the American lady 
 who lived up on the hill at Huiry ? " 
 
 I owned up. 
 
 " I have heard of you," he said. " I have a 
 friend who was quartered in your house." 
 
 Then he settled down to chat. He seemed 
 to need it, which is unusual. He appeared to be 
 about forty-five — a lieutenant. He asked all 
 sorts of things about the States — how long it 
 would take their army to get ready ? What 
 sort of soldiers did I think they would make ? 
 How many did I think were over ? And so 
 forth. 
 
 I did my best, but I could not tell him how 
 many were over, and we would not be really 
 ready until the army was here. The only thing 
 of which I could actually assure him was that the 
 boys from the States would, with a little ex- 
 perience, make as fine soldiers as the war has yet 
 seen. On that point I was absolutely sure, and 
 I gave it to him, with emphasis, that, in my 
 opinion, old Kaiser Bill would have no greater 
 disillusion in the war than the United States 
 would furnish him, in proving to him that it did 
 not take a lifetime of drilling to create a patriotic 
 army, and that a patriotic army was better than a 
 professional one. 
 
 With a sigh of content he leaned back, and I 
 realized again how great a factor in the morale of 
 
 159
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 the French the coming over of the boys from the 
 States was. After a short silence he smiled at 
 me, and said : 
 
 a Ridiculous — a war. You see, in the days 
 before this came I was what one calls, with 
 considerable contempt now, c an intellectual.' I 
 did not believe in force. I believed in the 
 spiritual development of the individual. But in 
 days of peace does any man know what is really 
 in him ? I've given my only son," and he 
 touched the black band on his sleeve. " Thank 
 God his mother went first. Fve done my duty 
 as best I could," and he touched the red ribbon 
 on his breast, with the barred one of military 
 medals beside it. " But I often wonder if all 
 educated men have to make the same struggle 
 that I do. Often, when the moment comes to 
 1 go over,' I wonder what my men would think 
 if I were to cry out, ' Fire in the air ! It is 
 nobler to be killed than to kill.' " He looked 
 out of the window a moment before he laughed 
 and added, " Absurd, isn't it ? Because I know 
 that a war of defence and for principle, and for 
 the hopes of the future, is a holy war." 
 
 Here the train began to slow down. 
 
 " Helloa ! Vaires already ? I hope that I 
 have not bored you ? " And as he buckled his 
 belt, and picked up his bag, he added, " It is so 
 rarely that I talk to a woman — I've no family 
 — that I rather lose my head. A thousand 
 excuses. Good-bye." And we shook hands 
 like old friends. 
 
 I watched him as he walked rapidly away. A 
 
 1 60
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 lieutenant at forty-five ! That meant that he was 
 a volunteer. 
 
 I have been sitting here, off and on, all day, 
 writing this. That shows my need of communion 
 in these trying days, when we are asking our- 
 selves where the next attack is to be, and hoping 
 that it will not take us by surprise. 
 
 I smile when I remember that in the first hard 
 days of the first week in March I tried to comfort 
 the people about me by saying : " Courage ! 
 This is the beginning of the final act." So it is, 
 I suppose. But there are to be more scenes in it 
 than I thought then. They are still strong, those 
 Huns. 
 
 I do hope that when I write so frankly of the 
 emotions of each day here you do not get the 
 impression that any one has lost faith in the final 
 issue. 1 don't think they have. It is only that 
 they are not so sure as they were up to the 
 opening of this offensive that this special part of 
 France may not have to be sacrificed as so many 
 places have been. If it is — well, never mind. In 
 our hearts, even trembling, we instinctively believe 
 in a second miracle. Yet why should we ? 
 
 m 161
 
 XXII 
 
 May 24, 19 1 8 
 
 We are still sitting as tight as we can, waiting 
 for the next offensive move, which has held off 
 longer than was anticipated. The absolute un- 
 certainty as to the point in the line now menaced, 
 and the inevitable nervousness which comes from 
 waiting every night for an aerial attack, and 
 listening all day for the big cannon to begin 
 firing on Paris, makes each hour of the twenty- 
 four a bit trying. Of course the last of the three 
 grosse Berthas was destroyed by the aviators on 
 the 3rd. But we know that it will not stay out 
 of action for ever. 
 
 I have kept busy planting, cleaning house, 
 arranging all sorts of extra curtains, but, luckily 
 the nights are getting very short and the Gotha 
 raids do not force me to be hermetically sealed 
 for long at a time. It is hardly dark at half-past 
 nine, and it begins to get light before four. I 
 have already learned to go about in my shuttered 
 house in the dark when an alerte gets me out of 
 bed, though there is no need. But an odd sensa- 
 tion comes over me during an attack, especially 
 as the batteries for the defence surround us 
 now in a semicircle — there are five of them. 
 
 162
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 When they all begin to fire, I feel as if my 
 little house were the only visible thing in the 
 landscape, and as though, if I lit up, even behind 
 shutters and curtains, I should be seen. If that 
 is not the «th power of vanity, I don't know 
 what to name it. 
 
 I expect you will get tired of hearing about 
 air raids, but really, if I do not tell you about 
 them I should be at a loss to know of what I 
 could write to you. They are of almost nightly 
 occurrence, and each one is different. We had 
 a double one last night — or one in two acts — 
 covering four hours and a half, with an entracte 
 of three-quarters of an hour. 
 
 It was about eleven o'clock. I was reading 
 quietly when I heard the guns from the fort. 
 I intended to stay comfortably in bed. It had 
 been understood between Amelie and me that, 
 under no circumstances, was she to come to me. 
 In the first place, it is forbidden by orders, and 
 in the second, now that the barrage surrounds 
 us, there is danger from spent shot from the 
 guns of the forts. But at the end of half an 
 hour I could not resist going out to try to see 
 what was happening. I had hardly got into the 
 garden before the guns ceased firing, and I went 
 back to bed. It was only a little over an hour 
 later, when boom went the cannon again, and 
 the raid lasted until nearly daylight. This time 
 I went out at once. It is impossible to resist 
 the impulse. In spite of all the regulations there 
 was a group in the road above my house, at a 
 point where they can look right over the fort 
 
 163
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 at Chelles into the horizon line over Paris, and 
 from which point they can see and locate each 
 searchlight and can often see the explosion of 
 the shells. I suppose they will continue to do 
 this until a bit of spent shrapnel hits some one 
 in the head, and demonstrates to them that it 
 is not safe. 
 
 It made a rather long night, but when the 
 last gun fired, just before daybreak, I was still 
 sitting on the lawn. All through the night I 
 had heard the military trains on the railroad 
 rushing along the valley, and, when the dim 
 coming of day enabled me to see them, I noticed 
 that a scouting engine preceded each train, as 
 in the early days of the mobilization. So I was 
 not surprised a few hours later to learn that a 
 bomb had fallen within fifty yards of the tunnel 
 at Charlifert. 
 
 While I was still sitting there, Amelie joined 
 me. She was all dressed, and I knew that she 
 had not been in bed at all. 
 
 It was not quite four o'clock. A beautiful 
 day was breaking. The cuckoo was talking. A 
 blackbird began to sing. Then the sparrows 
 and the swallows yawned and chirped, and a 
 thrush piped up. Overhead, the avions de chasse 
 were still scouting. Out at the big camp, lying 
 along miles of the fields, across the Marne, 
 Heche ttes, thin white lines of light, mounted like 
 silver arrows straight into the air at regular 
 intervals, to guide the aviators back to their 
 landing-field. Now and then, a coloured light 
 in the air announced a flyer ready to descend, 
 
 164
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 then in a moment, the big lights on the field 
 would flare up, and in the coming daylight we 
 would see a machine circling down. We sat 
 there until, at half-past four, the last homing 
 avion was in. It was no use to go to bed at 
 that hour, so as the days are hot, I weeded 
 and watered the garden, set out a few begonias 
 which Amelie went to Meaux for yesterday, 
 and some of the seedlings — zinnias, soucis, and 
 old-fashioned balsam. I promise myself to go 
 to bed with the chickens to-night to make up. 
 
 I note that you send your love to Khaki and 
 Dick. I have given your message to the Grand 
 Due, but Dick is very unpopular at this moment, 
 and civilities are suspended between us. 
 
 I think I told you that Dick had got so that 
 he never barked at a poilu ? The army might 
 come and carry off the house, and me in it, he 
 would consider it all right. Like the Grande 
 Duchesse he loves the military. Well, lately, life 
 has been very dull for him. Since he cannot run 
 free without a muzzle, his one idea is to escape, 
 and go in search of his adored poilus, since they 
 don't just now come to see him. I expect they 
 let him lick out their gamelles. It saves washing 
 them. Anyway, last week there was a regiment 
 at Quincy. Dick disappeared. He was gone for 
 nearly a week. I kept hearing of him, but the 
 regiment had been gone nearly forty-eight hours 
 before he reappeared. Amelie opened the door 
 for him. He made a dash upstairs and tried to 
 jump on the bed to give me an affectionate morn- 
 ing greeting, as he is allowed to do when he is 
 
 165
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 good. I repulsed him severely, and tried to have 
 an explanation with him. I demanded, at least, 
 to know where he had been since the regiment 
 departed. He was very reticent. He looked at 
 me, and scratched his head behind his ear in a very 
 knowing manner — had brought a military flea with 
 him, I suppose — and expected that to satisfy me. 
 It distinctly did not. So he was sent down to his 
 kennel and chained. I hope he knew why. Still, 
 as he had evidently had a good time, he probably 
 felt that it was worth while being chained up for 
 a day. 
 
 However, the explanation I could not get from 
 him followed almost at once. He had evidently 
 waited about Quincy hoping some more soldiers 
 might arrive, and in the waiting time he had been 
 overcome by hunger, and gone marketing for 
 himself — on tick — and his bills followed him 
 home. He had eaten a franc- twenty-five centimes' 
 worth of sausage at the charcuterie. He had 
 spoiled a pound of cheese at the cremerie. He 
 had decamped with a bone worth fifty centimes at 
 the butcher's, which would have been allowed him 
 if he had not returned and helped himself to a 
 costly chop — one franc-fifty. On the morning of 
 the third day — no regiment arriving — he evidently 
 decided that life was too difficult, and that he had 
 better return to his regular boarding-house, where, 
 at least, meals were certain, and wait until more 
 soldiers and more gamelks arrived. I paid the 
 bills of the prodigal, of course, but I did not kill 
 any fatted calf for him. Not that he minded that, 
 for, to tell you the truth, he rendered up some of 
 
 1 66
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 the stolen goods soon after his return, and then 
 rolled himself up to sleep it off. 
 
 While 1 am speaking about Dick, I must tell 
 you another amusing thing. He has discovered 
 the aeroplanes. For a long time, whenever a 
 machine flew low, as they often do, he has rushed 
 out and barked furiously all over the place. Just 
 for fun, one day, I held him by his collar and tried 
 to make him look in the right direction. I never 
 succeeded. He looked everywhere but at the 
 proper place over his head. But one day, standing 
 with Amelie and me in the garden while a big 
 triplane was passing, he discovered it himself. 
 He began barking, running madly after it, and 
 trying to jump the hedge. Since then, he has 
 learned where to look when he hears them, and 
 he always runs the length of the garden, eyes in 
 the air, head erect, yelping and jumping. Of 
 course, he thinks it is a big bird, though he never 
 barks at birds. But birds don't make such a 
 racket. 
 
 I have seen some wonderful flights of avions 
 lately — some twenty in battle formation. It is a 
 wonderful sight here where the sky space is so 
 extensive. One of the prettiest flights the other 
 day was so high that, if it had not been for the 
 noise the moteurs made, I should not have detected 
 them at all — they looked so tiny in the blue depth 
 of that vast expanse — no larger than the swallow 
 flying under them, thousands and thousands of 
 feet below. 
 
 Kind of you to congratulate me on dropping 
 out of the political note. As for that, I was stirred 
 
 167
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 when Caillaux went to live at La Sante, and I shall 
 get excited again when he — goes on. For all the 
 smaller men who are moving out of the line of 
 vision I am little concerned so that they go and 
 en route close the pincers on the chief. Political 
 trials are delicate affairs in the democratic world 
 in which a man is said to have a right to his 
 opinions, but in times of war there are things 
 more important than opinions. The discipline to 
 which an army defending the country must submit, 
 and failure to do which incurs the penalty of death 
 for the soldier, surely applies in some way to 
 civilians. Until it is demonstrated that it does, 
 there can be no consolations for the terrible affair 
 of last May, or for the tragedy of Cceuvres. That 
 is all. 
 
 1 68
 
 XXIII 
 
 May 7,0, 191 8 
 
 It has been a very trying week. Indeed, as I 
 look back to the long months of war, I realize 
 that it was only when, on the last day of January, 
 Germany began the effort of which this week is 
 only one phase, that we really began to appreciate 
 the f rightfulness of her endeavour. Since that 
 day, no one within hearing of the front has had 
 a day of tranquillity, and no one in France an 
 hour free of anxiety. For that matter, no one in 
 the world, capable of understanding or sympathy, 
 can have been calm. But it is surely a different 
 thing to read about these days than to take part 
 in them. I cannot write you about the life here 
 in detail, because, as I have already assured you, 
 things are all changed by the time you read the 
 letters, and you know long before you get them 
 what turn affairs have taken. And then, there is 
 always the censor. 
 
 There has hardly been a night since I wrote 
 you last without an air raid, and on the night of 
 the day I last wrote you, we were showered with 
 spent shrapnel. It fell on the roofs at Voisins 
 and I am treasuring for you, as a personal 
 souvenir of me and the war, a large jagged bit 
 
 169
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 which struck the shutter of my bedroom window 
 and bounded on to the terrace. 
 
 On the day before the long-awaited offensive 
 began on our front, on the historic Chemin des 
 Dames, everything was quiet here. It was a 
 Sunday. We had had five air raids in about eight 
 days. The weather had been very hot, and I had 
 felt a bit shaky. But on Saturday — that was the 
 25th — I had a telegram from Paris telling 
 me that a friend was leaving for Bordeaux on 
 Monday, and, as she could not get a sauf conduit 
 to come to me, begged me to come up to town, 
 if only for an hour. So I was up at five, and at 
 six Pere was driving me down to the station to 
 take the seven-o'clock train. We always have 
 to allow plenty of time for fear of being delayed 
 on the road by military camions. 
 
 It was a lovely morning, full of sunshine, but 
 with the fresh breeze blowing from the north-east 
 still, as it has for weeks. As we turned from 
 the Chemin Madame into the route nationale^ we 
 found ourselves face to face with a procession of 
 artillery camions extending as far as we could see 
 in the direction of Meaux, and down the hill to 
 Couilly, where, one after another, they continued 
 to come round the curve from St. Germain during 
 our entire descent to the station. The camions 
 had cannon of all calibres mounted, each followed 
 by a load of gunners, and every little way came 
 ammunition-trucks and rolling kitchens. Every 
 cannon's nose, as it stuck its carefully capped 
 muzzle between the heads of the chauffeur and 
 mechanician, was wreathed with flowers, and every 
 
 170
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 camion carried a huge bunch of red peonies or 
 roses, with daisies and some blue field flowers — 
 always making the French colours. The gunners 
 all had clean, smiling, Sunday faces, but, as Ninette 
 ambled down the hill in the cloud of dust made 
 by the camions groaning and rumbling up it, 1 felt 
 that this tremendous movement of artillery must 
 be the prelude to the offensive, and that the 
 movement just here must mean that it was the 
 line from Soissons to Reims which was threatened. 
 I said nothing to Pere. I was coming back in the 
 middle of the afternoon. 
 
 I made an easy trip to Paris. Although it was 
 Sunday, there was no crowd. Nor was there any 
 unusual movement of troops on the line. I found 
 the streets more animated than usual. It was 
 three weeks since the long-range gun, which had 
 so long bombarded the city, had been silenced. 
 It looked as if a great many people who had left 
 Paris during the March offensive had returned. 
 The animation in the streets was not that of even 
 a year ago, but it was anything but a dead city or 
 a sad city to me. So I forgot all about my im- 
 pression of the morning until, as I was driving 
 back by the road from Esbly, in the middle of the 
 afternoon, the picture suddenly returned to me, 
 and I instinctively turned to look across the 
 Marne, and listened for the guns. Not a sound. 
 Perhaps I was mistaken, I thought. 
 
 We had a peaceful night. I went out early the 
 next morning. All was silent. But while I was 
 having my coffee there was one heavy shot. I 
 jumped. It was once more that big gun firing on 
 
 171
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Paris. There was no doubt in my mind — that 
 was the accompaniment, or the prelude, to the new 
 battle. But still we heard no sound of artillery in 
 the direction of the front. The only explanation 
 seemed to us was that the attack was, after all, not 
 here but on a part of the line farther north — 
 perhaps again in Picardy where the attack of 
 March had carried the Germans nearer the sea 
 and nearer still to the railroad communication so 
 important to the British. So you can imagine our 
 surprise when the news came that the attack, which 
 had begun at three o'clock in the morning, was 
 against the line in front of us from Montdidier in 
 the west, with Compiegne and the route to Paris 
 down the Oise valley, Chateau-Thierry and the 
 route down the Marne, Reims and Chalons, as 
 objectives. 
 
 The big gun, which had begun to bombard 
 Paris at half-past six in the morning, was still 
 firing at half-past six at night, and at half-past ten 
 at night there was an air raid which lasted about 
 an hour and a quarter. 
 
 With all one's pluck held tight in both hands, 
 and our morale builded up on the same principles 
 that are handed out to the soldiers, you must 
 agree that there is something appalling in this 
 determined, reckless exhibition of brute force. 
 Even although I am not a bit sentimental about 
 this, I must remark that it seems to be stupid. 
 The demonstration does not seriously alarm any 
 one — it surely demoralizes no one. It must be 
 pretty costly. Besides that, the amount of harm 
 it does is infinitesimal in comparison to the effort. 
 
 172
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 One life sacrificed in that way is one too many, 
 but more lives are lost almost any day by the 
 ordinary accidents of life than by this superman 
 effort of frightfulness. As for the air raids — they 
 get less and less effective, as the air defence is 
 elaborated by actual experience. 
 
 Trying as the week has been, it has been 
 absolutely different from that of the big battle of 
 March. We have hardly heard a gun. Dead 
 silence has reigned here, and that silence has been 
 terribly trying. We have known that it was 
 largely an infantry battle, and all the time the 
 wind has blown steadily from the north-east — 
 what Amelie calls " le vent des Roches" because it 
 is a wind which brings their gas over. But that 
 is the prevailing wind here at this season, and the 
 Germans have made a great study of meteorology 
 as a military science. In the drive towards Amiens 
 in March, the heavy guns played a big part, and 
 for days and nights the earth shook with the 
 artillery play even as far south as this. To-day, 
 the fourth of this battle, the silence is almost 
 terrifying. I keep saying to myself, " Will the 
 heavy artillery never get to work ? " 
 
 We have lost Craonne, and the Chemin des 
 Dames, and how many a tragic hilltop ! Day 
 after day we trace the battle-line as well as we can, 
 and, as it approaches us, the only consolation is 
 that though it bends and curves and stretches, it 
 does not break. The Germans have again crossed 
 the Aisne and the Vesle, and were last night at 
 Fismes, which the English retook in October, 
 1 9 14, something like twenty miles nearer to us. 
 
 173
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Reims is holding out superbly. But for that 
 matter, with its tremendous underground struc- 
 tures, it is practically impregnable. I don't believe 
 it can be taken except by a siege, but the Ger- 
 mans are encircling it and rapidly approaching 
 Chateau-Thierry, which threatens our railroad 
 communications. 
 
 It was only last week that I had a letter from 
 you in which you said : " Of course they will 
 attack again. They must or own themselves 
 defeated. But they will not be so strong." Hm ! 
 They were 650,000 against 80,000 when this 
 battle began. Of course, that was before our 
 reserves were brought up. I sit trembling for 
 fear of a panic again. I cannot blame these poor 
 people. They are as loyal as possible, but our 
 roads are again crowded with refugees flying from 
 the front. It is a horrid sight. 
 
 Wednesday a man rested at my gate. He had 
 been obliged to leave his farm when the surprise 
 attack forced the army back so quickly Sunday 
 that civilians had no time to save anything but 
 their lives. He had left his big modern reaping 
 machines — they had to be destroyed to keep them 
 from falling into German hands. He had left 
 two thousand pounds of beans, requisitioned by 
 the army — there was no time to move them, and 
 they were not paid for — burned that the enemy 
 might not get them. And he is only one of 
 thousands, and it is inevitable that, after the first 
 excitement, must come the sense of personal loss. 
 I could understand that, for this is the second 
 time he had been driven out. 
 
 174
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 It was hard to find just the right thing to say — 
 especially as I was safe — so far. No personal 
 sacrifice has been asked of me. So I said finally : 
 "Don't be discouraged yet. All these things will 
 be arranged, and your children will have a better 
 world to live in. Besides, the American boys are 
 coming over as fast as they can get here. There 
 are nearly a million here now, I should think." 
 
 He shook his head. " Too late," he replied. 
 " What are a million against the three millions the 
 Huns have brought from Russia ? " 
 
 Well, there you are, and can you blame him ? 
 
 It was Wednesday that things began to look 
 serious here. On that day the scenes of 19 14 
 began to repeat themselves. The better class began 
 to fly. The humbler farmers and peasants 
 began to hide their belongings. Caves and sub- 
 terranean passages were again filled with furniture, 
 bedding and household treasures, even clothing. 
 Some of the richer farmers began to drive their 
 cattle south, and some people even wheeled their 
 possessions in wheelbarrows to the quarries at 
 Mareuil, where work had stopped, owing to the 
 bombs that have fallen there. 
 
 It was in vain that I argued that there was no 
 immediate danger ; that we should get warning if 
 it were necessary to go ; that the roads were 
 sufficiently blocked already by those who had been 
 driven out, and by the army, without our adding 
 further to the*' confusion. The peasants and the 
 farmers would listen — if you set them the example, 
 you can count on them, but not so well on those 
 who have a place to go to, and money in their 
 
 *75
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 pockets to get there. Besides, I really was " talk- 
 ing through my hat," and I thought to myself, 
 u If I am a bad prophet they may mob me, and 
 serve me right for interfering." 
 
 In the meantime Amelie sat tight. I had her 
 fixed with my eye — and she had not forgotten 
 1914. 
 
 Thursday — that was yesterday — was the hardest 
 day. All night the confusion on the road was 
 terrible. Sleep was impossible. On that day, 
 while every one was rushing about hiding things — 
 too busy to do any work in the fields — a group of 
 refugees arrived here. As a rule, we, who are off" 
 the main road, see them at Quincy and Voisins, 
 and Couilly, and go out to help them. But just 
 before sunset yesterday one of the children of the 
 hamlet came running to the gate with the news 
 that a group of emigres were crossing the hilltop 
 by the Chemin Madame. Of course if they were 
 taking that road, they were coming here. It leads 
 nowhere else. The first impulse of every one 
 seemed to be to hang back. Refugees here, where 
 every one was so nervous, seemed to them the last 
 straw — especially at the moment when they felt 
 pretty sure that another day or two might see 
 them all refugees themselves. But they are 
 children, these simple people. So when I started 
 hurriedly up the road, without a word, to meet 
 them, they all followed, as I knew they would. I 
 thought of how it must feel to be driven out of 
 one's home, and to enter, at sundown of a hot 
 day, into a little hamlet like this, not knowing 
 what kind of a reception awaited one — was it 
 
 176
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 to be a welcome, or only curious looks from 
 indifferent eyes ? 
 
 As 1 reached the corner I met coming across 
 the hill a procession of five loaded farm wagons, 
 drawn by big sturdy farm horses. Beside the 
 train marched a middle-aged man and half a 
 dozen boys. In the wagons rode the women and 
 children, and by them ran a couple of dogs. The 
 man walking at the head of the group, with a 
 heavy stick in his hand, looked about fifty, and 
 was apparently the leader. When I smiled him a 
 welcome, he took off* his hat, and then we shook 
 hands ceremoniously, and then the Huiry-ites all 
 followed suit. For a moment I thought it was 
 going to be a real function, and I was about to tell 
 him that I was not the Mayor of Huiry, but a 
 foreigner, when I was spared the trouble. He 
 spotted me at once, and said : "Vous etes Ameri- 
 caine, riest-ce -pas ? " So much for my accent. 
 He explained that he knew the accent. He had 
 left a lot of our boys where he had come from — 
 north of Compiegne. 
 
 When I asked him what we could do to make 
 the party comfortable, he explained that he had 
 been told that there was room on the hill to 
 shelter his horses for the night, and that that was 
 all they needed. If we could give the old grand- 
 mother and her little grandchild a bed, the rest 
 would camp, and then he added : " We don't want 
 to put any one out. We can pay for everything. 
 But the horses must rest for one night, as we have 
 been on the road since sunrise yesterday." 
 
 You should have seen how quickly it was 
 
 N I77
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 arranged. I took in the grandmother — she was 
 not as old as I am, by the way — and the little 
 child, whose father had been killed, and whose 
 mother is a nurse in a hospital in Paris, and a 
 pretty blonde girl, who proved to be the aunt, and 
 inside half an hour the horses were stabled, the 
 wagons under cover, and beds ready for every one, 
 and a kitchen found in the house across the road 
 from me, which was empty. 
 
 You can get some idea of what these people are 
 like when I tell you, in a jiffy the women turned 
 up the skirts of their best dresses, got out their 
 big aprons, and went to work to get their dinner. 
 They had everything with them — chickens, rabbits, 
 vegetables, tinned things, bread, and even charcoal. 
 A kind welcome had made them cheerful, and 
 before nine o'clock they were all established at an 
 improvised table on the roadside, eating, chatting 
 and laughing. It was a sight that did us all good. 
 
 It was not much after ten when the women went 
 to bed, leaving the men to clear up and re-pack. It 
 was a family of neighbours — rich shop-keepers, 
 hotel-keepers, and their farm hands, and farmers. 
 One man told me that he alone had left fifty 
 thousand francs' worth of materials behind him, 
 and his only prayer was that the Allies had been 
 able to take it or destroy it. There was no sign 
 of class distinction. They were all one family, 
 and had all such pretty manners. The baby — 
 about three — came to offer her little hand when 
 she was put to bed, and lisp her " Bon soir, 
 Madame, et bonne nuit" and one after another of 
 the group came into the garden to say good-night. 
 
 178
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 The elderly man remarked that it would be 
 pleasant to sleep out of the sound of the guns. I 
 had to laugh, as 1 replied : 
 
 " Well, I am sorry that we cannot promise you 
 that. We are just in front of the guns of the 
 outer forts of Paris, and we get a Gotha visit 
 almost every night." 
 
 But that idea did not disturb them. They had 
 been accustomed to so much worse. And sure 
 enough, we had hardly got into bed, when, at 
 about twenty minutes past eleven, the guns began 
 to fire from the forts, and for an hour and a 
 quarter the noise was infernal. 
 
 I was up early this morning, but, as 1 wanted 
 to keep the house quiet, in order that my tired 
 guests might sleep, I came upstairs to write to you. 
 The news is bad — the Germans are in Soissons 
 again, and the Allied army is still retreating south 
 and west. Poor Soissons ! This makes the third 
 time its people have had to get out. I remember 
 so well that day in the end of August — the 29th, 
 I think — in 19 14, when the British lost it the 
 first time. But a fortnight later people were 
 returning, though they did not stay long, as the 
 following January the Germans began bombarding 
 it, and it was not until March, 191 7, that the 
 town was again safe for civilians, and now, for 
 the third time, these poor people are wanderers 
 again. 
 
 Well, my guests are beginning to move about. 
 Amelie is calling me to my coffee, and I will finish 
 this later. 
 
 179
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Later 
 
 All sorts of things have happened since I went 
 down to breakfast. I have only time to add a 
 few words to this. News has come that the rail- 
 road is cut — for civilians — at Meaux. There is 
 no certainty that even that communication with 
 Paris will not at any moment become impossible. 
 I am leaving for Paris — only for twenty-four 
 hours — at five o'clock. 
 
 I will write to explain from there. In the 
 meantime there is no need for you to worry yet. 
 In case of any change in my plans 1 shall cable so 
 that you will know where I am. I shall time the 
 cable to reach you before this letter does so that 
 you will not be left in any uncertainty. In case 
 you have received no word by wire when this 
 reaches you, you are to understand that I am 
 back here, and all is well. 
 
 1 80
 
 XXIV 
 
 5 Villa Victor Hugo, Paris, June I, 191 8 
 
 Well, here we are, in practically the same 
 situation as on that memorable September day in 
 1 9 14, when Amelie and I made our rush to Paris, 
 to return the same night and find the British army 
 at the gate, at the end of that tragic two weeks' 
 retreat from Mons. 
 
 This is what happened. 
 
 The cordial welcome that my neighbours gave 
 the refugees who arrived Thursday on the hilltop 
 braced them up and consoled them at the end of 
 their two days' pilgrimage in the heat and dust, 
 and their calm and courage braced us all up. 
 But alas ! the bad news of Friday morning spoiled 
 all that. When 1 went into the garden after my 
 coffee, I found them in the road at the gate, 
 with their heads over a newspaper examining a 
 map of the front. I was not especially surprised 
 when the leader came into the garden a little later, 
 and said : 
 
 " Well, Madame, although you were all so kind 
 as to urge us last night to rest here to-day and 
 not go on until to-morrow, we have decided that 
 it is hardly wise. We are leaving at once, and 
 making for Melun. The roads are crowded now, 
 
 181
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 and it seems to us most unsafe here. We hope 
 to reach Melun during the night." 
 
 Two hours later they were gone. 
 
 Not long after, while I was sitting in the 
 garden, listening to the confused noises from the 
 moving trains of refugees on the road, and trying 
 to make up my mind calmly what it was wisest to 
 do, Amelie came out, and began to argue the 
 matter with me. To my surprise I found that 
 her mind was fixed on having me go to Paris at 
 least, and wait there for the turn of the tide — for 
 turn it must. I don't really know why it must, 
 but I feel that it will. All her arguments did 
 not seem sound, but some of them were wise 
 enough. 
 
 She argued that every one had gone but the 
 farmers and peasants ; that the situation was 
 different from that of 19 14 ; that then I belonged 
 to the most powerful of the neutral countries, 
 whereas to-day I belonged to the most hated of 
 Germany's enemies ; that even if we were not 
 invaded we risked being bombarded ; that in case 
 of a bombardment they could all live in the 
 subterranean passages, and not mind it too much, 
 but that it would be unnecessarily uncomfortable 
 for me ; that I could still get to Paris with a 
 trunk, but in case of a hurried evacuation later I 
 would have to go without clothes — and finally, as 
 a crowning argument, she said, " We all want you 
 to go, and we shall feel less anxious when you are 
 in a safer place." 
 
 I heard her out, but I was doing some pretty 
 tall thinking. One thing was certain — I had to 
 
 182
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 have motiey. Wasn't history repeating itself ? 
 It was already taking three and sometimes four 
 days to get a letter into Paris, and almost as many 
 to get one out. That meant that it would take 
 nearly a week to get money by mail, and 
 communications might be cut at any minute. 
 Besides, Amelie was quite right on one point — 
 it might be prudent for me to have a trunk in 
 Paris, so that, in case we were ordered out, I 
 could at least find clean clothes at the end of my 
 voyage. 
 
 Finally I cut the argument short. 
 
 "All right, Amelie," I said. "I'll go up to 
 Paris. But I shall come right back as soon as I 
 get some money, see how things really are in 
 Paris, and leave my trunk." 
 
 "Good," said Amelie, jumping up. "Pack 
 the trunk at once. There is a train at five. I'll 
 harness in an hour. That will give you time 
 enough, and we must allow for the crowd on the 
 road." 
 
 I protested that the next morning would do, 
 but she insisted that it was possible that the next 
 morning I might not be able to get away. I 
 didn't believe it, but, in the end, 1 took the five- 
 o'clock train — that was day before yesterday, the 
 day on which 1 last wrote to you. 
 
 We started away silently, except that I assured 
 every one who came out to say good-bye to me 
 that there was no good-bye, as I was coming back, 
 surely no later than Monday. But as we drove 
 across the Chemin Madame I was surprised to find 
 that Amelie was crying, a thing she rarely does. 
 
 183
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 When I leaned forward to smile into her face she 
 quite broke down. 
 
 " You must not try to come back. None of 
 us want you to. It is too dangerous. After this 
 is all over we can find one another again. We 
 will do all that we can to save your house and all 
 your things." 
 
 " Nonsense," I replied, " of course I am coming 
 back ! You are to go to Couilly to fetch me at 
 two o'clock on Sunday, and, in case I am not 
 there, at the same hour Monday, when I shall 
 surely be there. In the meantime, if I can 
 telegraph, I will. Do you understand ? " 
 
 " I understand that you are coming if you can 
 get back!' 
 
 " Fudge," I replied, but I knew that I was 
 taking that chance, so I hurriedly gave her 
 certain instructions in case our hill was evacuated ; 
 emptied what money I had on me into her lap ; 
 carefully wrote out a couple of addresses, in and 
 out of Paris, where she could reach me ; arranged 
 what was to be done about all the beasties in case 
 worse came to worst, and the one consolation I 
 felt was that in case Amelie was right and I wrong 
 about the situation I could certainly serve them 
 better by going than staying. If a bombardment 
 drove them down into the caves I should be an 
 embarrassment to them. If military orders drove 
 them into the roads, why there were a horse and 
 donkey and two covered wagons, and again they 
 would be more at ease without me, while outside 
 the zone I could help them better than inside, and 
 prepare a refuge for them. 
 
 184
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 But as I stood on the steps at the station 
 watching Amelie drive away 1 knew that she was 
 still crying — her mind made up for the worst. I 
 simply refused to consider that it could happen. 
 I was not gay. Who could be ? You never saw 
 such a sight as the gare was. The refugees who 
 had arrived thus far on foot, with their pitiful 
 bags and parcels, were being taken on by the 
 railroad. Hundreds of women an</l children from 
 Couilly and St. Germain and Quincy were flying, 
 taking beds and all sorts of boxes and bundles 
 with them. It was 19 14 all over again, only a 
 hundred times sadder. 
 
 At Esbly, where we changed cars, it was even 
 worse. 
 
 The train from Meaux was over an hour and 
 a half late. The platform was piled with boxes 
 and bundles, trunks and baby-carriages loaded 
 with parcels, baskets and rolled-up bedding. The 
 crowd was as sad-looking as the baggage — women 
 leading children and dogs, carrying bundles of all 
 sorts, and string-bags in which shoes and bread 
 were conspicuous. There were birds in cages, 
 and cats crying in baskets. The sight did not 
 tend to make any one gay. 
 
 It was a strangely silent crowd that stood during 
 that hour and a half of weary waiting while train 
 after train of rolling stock from up the line was 
 hurried towards Paris, and train after train of 
 military material was rushed through to Meaux. 
 When the train, which should have come at 
 twenty minutes to six, finally pulled in at almost 
 half-past seven, it seemed to me that I was back 
 
 185
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 at that day in 19 14 — over forty-five months 
 ago. 
 
 If the trip to town had not had some en- 
 couraging moments I am afraid that I might have 
 arrived in Paris in a mood not far removed from 
 that in which I had left Amelie at Huiry. 
 
 The crowd in the packed compartment, in 
 which I found a place, was interesting. There 
 was a family from Nancy, which had been stopping 
 at Meaux, there was an infirmihe from the big 
 military hospital, Val de Grace, and people flying 
 from Meaux, and the principal topic of con- 
 versation was quite naturally, the " boys from the 
 States." The greatest anxiety of every one but 
 the nurse was that the delay of the train would 
 force them to remain over night in bombarded 
 Paris. 
 
 We should have been in Paris before seven 
 o'clock. We got there at ten minutes to nine. 
 
 All along the line we had been side-tracked 
 or held up to let long military trains have the right 
 of wav — trains packed w\thpoilus — those closed cars 
 marked " hommes, 40, chevaux, 8 " ; you remember 
 them ? — with men sitting in the open doors, their 
 feet hanging out, all smoking and laughing, trains 
 camoufle with splashes of green and dirt-coloured 
 paint ; trucks on which were mounted all sorts of 
 cannon, their noses in the air, trains of ammuni- 
 tion wagons, trains of trucks carrying huge gas- 
 tanks with all sorts of cautionary directions in 
 huge letters, and, finally, as we drew out of 
 Vaires and stopped, we came alongside of the 
 first train Hindi and the first tanks I had ever 
 
 186
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 seen. The huge armoured train — camoufle^ of 
 course — consisted of four enormous cars, and 
 each had its lower car for the gunners. On the 
 lower roofs sat the men, singing and laughing — 
 most of them in their shirt-sleeves — extraordinary 
 for French boys — and each car had its mascot. 
 On one was a white lamb, with a ribbon about his 
 neck. On one was a monkey. On one was a 
 white poodle, who looked as if he had just had a 
 bath. On the fourth was a bird in a cage. 
 
 Somehow all this bucked me up tremendously. 
 Every one was hanging out of the car windows. 
 There was a hearty exchange of courtesies. 
 There was no sign of anything but high faith 
 and cheery good humour on the faces of any of 
 these men, who, inside a very few hours, would 
 probably be in the thick of it. I drew a long 
 breath as I thought to myself, " Well, the French 
 are not all dead yet. With spirit like this they 
 ought to be able to stem the tide." 
 
 The scene at the station in Paris beggared all 
 description. Never since the war began have I 
 seen anything like it. The baggage was piled, 
 pell-mell, on the platforms. It had been appar- 
 ently many days since there had been any empty 
 space in the baggage-rooms. One had to pick 
 one's way through it to find an exit. I found an 
 old porter who knew me to carry my bag, and 
 gave him a receipt for my trunk. He shook his 
 head and advised me not to try to get it that 
 night, as it would surely be hours before 1 could 
 find it, and by that time it would be impossible 
 to get a cab, as it would be dark, and cabs do 
 
 i8 7
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 not care to make long trips after dark, when a 
 Gotha attack is an almost nightly occurrence. 
 There seemed to be nothing else to do, although, 
 as I looked about, I saw no reason why any one 
 could not help himself to a good-looking small 
 trunk like mine and walk off with it. 
 
 When we got outside there was no cab in sight, 
 and a crowd waiting. So the old man told me to 
 stay right where I was — not budge, no matter 
 what happened, even if he should be ten minutes. 
 So there I stood fixed in the twilight, watching 
 the scene. Now and then a taxi-auto would come 
 in through the gate. Instantly twenty people 
 would rush to meet it. It was a real case of short 
 distance sprinting and no favour. 
 
 But that did not interest me as much as the big 
 camions of the American Red Cross which have 
 done most of the rescue work during this evacua- 
 tion. The refugees who arrive at this station, 
 after they have been fed and cleaned, are carried 
 by these big camions to the stations on the lines 
 going out to the south and west. It was exciting 
 for Parisians to see these great open camions, with 
 sturdy American lads in their sombreros, in their 
 shirt-sleeves — with the sleeves rolled to the elbows 
 at that — standing braced on widespread feet, with 
 their arms folded, as the autos bumped over the 
 pavements. 
 
 It was not ten, but twenty, minutes before my 
 old porter finally came back, riding on the run- 
 ing-board of a taxi. I was glad to see him, I can 
 tell you. It was already dark. It was ten o'clock 
 when I reached my destination, and I had left 
 
 188
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 home at four, and had had no dinner — not that 
 this is very important in these days. 
 
 I had not even got through talking when the 
 alerte sounded. But this is getting to be a 
 common occurrence, so that it would not be worth 
 recording, if it had not been a rather unusual raid. 
 It was quarter to eleven when the first gun fired, 
 and fifty-five minutes later came the berloque. 
 But while the " all clear " was being bugled in the 
 streets there came a second alerte^ and for a few 
 minutes the sirene and the B flat bugle did a duet, 
 and I assure you it was comic. People who had 
 started from the abris said the whole thing was 
 very funny — the bugler lowered his bugle — the 
 fireman began tooting his horn — people who had 
 come out of the cellars ran back — anyway, here 
 are more points for the future makers of farce- 
 comedy. 
 
 After it was all over we stood for a while on 
 the balcony listening to the church bells ringing 
 out the message " all clear " in the suburbs. It 
 sounded so pretty. It is a pity that so alluring a 
 sound in the night should be associated with any- 
 thing so sinister. On our hill, the alerte is given 
 by tolling the bells. I don't enjoy that. We 
 have no " all clear " signal. We know when the 
 forts stop firing that it is over. 
 
 As soon as I had my trunk in Paris I wanted 
 to go right home again. I found real comfort in 
 the fact that if I were driven out of my home I 
 should have at least a change of shoes — they are 
 so costly just now — seventy-five francs a pair for 
 shoes that in the old days cost twenty-five. But 
 
 189
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 since I was in town it seemed wise to look the 
 situation over carefullyand provide for possibilities. 
 One thing was certain — if I were actually forced 
 out by military operations, with which neither 
 fear nor my own wishes had anything to do, why 
 then Paris would be no place to stay. 
 
 There is not in my mind the smallest chance of 
 Paris ever being taken or besieged. But there is 
 a chance that, if the Germans pass Compiegne, 
 they can mount the guns which bombarded 
 Antwerp, and still pound Dunkirk, and Paris may, 
 for a few days, be seriously bombarded. In case 
 of that possibility becoming a fact, I imagine that 
 few of us foreigners would be allowed to stay in 
 Paris, and I have spent all day to-day, which is 
 Sunday, arranging for that eventuality — that is to 
 say, all except what has been spent writing you 
 this long letter. 
 
 190
 
 XXV 
 
 June 4, 19 1 8 
 
 Well, here I am at home again, and I have 
 been very busy ever since I got here, most of the 
 time chuckling. Life is not all tragic, and it is 
 only a breath over the line to laughter, as usual. 
 
 I came back on Monday, the second, as I said 
 I should. The drive on Paris at both Chateau- 
 Thierry and Compiegne seems to be held up. 
 The Boches are in Chateau-Thierry, and they 
 have crossed the Marne at Dormans, south-east of 
 Chateau-Thierry, but they are still outside Com- 
 piegne. Yesterday was the eighth day of the big 
 battle, and it almost appears to be a rule that an 
 eight days ' drive is about all an army can stand. 
 
 The trip back was what it always is in these 
 days, as almost the only soldiers I meet on the 
 train are the boys from the States. But they are 
 not much given, just now, to talk. They know 
 little about the country, and their one desire 
 seems to be to get on to the job, get it done, and 
 get home. Besides, in spite of anything one can 
 do, there is a different feeling in one's heart 
 towards them. The French and English seem 
 hardened to it, and take it all as a matter of 
 course. The boys from the States do not, yet. 
 
 I found Amelie waiting at the station. She 
 
 191
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 was visibly surprised to see me. It was quite 
 evident that she had not expected me. She drove 
 me up the hill quite sadly, and her only comment 
 was : 
 
 " Now you'll have to do it all over again. I 
 was comfortable, knowing you were safe, and 
 now I've got to go through it all again." 
 
 When I got to the house, the moment 1 
 opened the door I discovered one reason for her 
 discomfort at my return. The house was dis- 
 mantled. My first impulse was to scold, but 
 when I realized how hard they must all have 
 worked, and with what good intention, I decided 
 to laugh loud and long instead. 
 
 I wish you could have seen the house. There 
 was not a curtain. There was not a dish in the 
 dining-room nor in the kitchen. The mirrors 
 were down, and pictures on the floor, faces to the 
 wall. My winter clothes, all the bed and body 
 linen and even kitchen towels had been packed, 
 and everything carried up the hill and hidden 
 underground. My first impulse as I looked 
 about the dismantled home was to be very cross, 
 but, before I opened my mouth I looked into the 
 library. There stood my books all along the 
 walls. She had not dared touch them. The 
 hearty laugh the sight simply knocked out of me 
 gave me time to appreciate it. As soon as I 
 could get my face straight I said : " Oh, Amelie, 
 Amelie ! And you said, in 19 14, that nothing 
 would ever induce you to do a thing like this 
 again ! " 
 
 "Well, mistress," she replied, "it's your things 
 
 192
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 I've hidden - this time," which was perfectly true. 
 Her own home had not been touched. 
 
 There was no reply to be made to that except 
 that I was grateful to her for leaving me something 
 to read and my typewriter. She had hidden the 
 phonograph. 
 
 She explained that she saw no way to hide the 
 books, as there were not cases enough or time 
 enough — and she reasoned that if the house were 
 destroyed, and evidently she had made up her 
 mind to that, I could go on without books, but 
 that 1 would be glad to have bedding and dishes 
 and clothes. I saw her point of view. She 
 did not see mine. 
 
 So you can guess how I am living. Amelie 
 has made me up one bed with her sheets. I 
 drink my coffee out of a bowl, and stir it with 
 a pewter spoon. I have two plates and a knife 
 and fork from her house. 1 know a little of 
 discomforts of which, up to now, I have had 
 none. I am going to support it a few days. I 
 really have not the heart to order all that hard 
 work done over again at once, especially as 
 Amelie is not yet sure that I may not have to 
 leave. 
 
 The atmosphere is anything but calm here. 
 Meaux was bombarded yesterday, and more harm 
 done in an hour than during the entire battle 
 of the Marne. In addition, one of the first 
 regiments du choc y the boys who fell back in the 
 first hour of the attack of May 27 — less than 
 two hundred are left of the regiment — came 
 here to rest before retiring further to reorganize, 
 o 193
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 Naturally they arrive in a sadly demoralized con- 
 dition, in a commune rather demoralized already. 
 It was an unfortunate combination. It was the 
 first time that the poilus had ever brought any- 
 thing but courage, hope and gaiety into the place. 
 
 Yet let me tell you a strange thing. Even 
 with Amelie, whose mind is made up that we 
 are to be invaded, that idea does not for a 
 moment mean that she believes in a defeat. It 
 does not do even to say to her " the Germans are 
 so strong." Any speech like that arouses her 
 anger. She replies with vicious emphasis : 
 
 " They are no stronger than we are. If they 
 are, why have they not beaten us, when they 
 were ready, and we were not, when they are 
 so much more numerous than we are, and have 
 three times as many guns ? " And they have, 
 you know. But that does not prevent one from 
 dreading an invasion all the same. 
 
 As long ago as the first weeks of the war I 
 wrote you that I could not foresee a defeat for 
 France, and that I believed that even if her 
 armies were beaten back to Bordeaux, with their 
 backs against the Biscay, I was convinced they 
 would still hold out. Of course they could not 
 have, if all the world had not come to their 
 aid, but isn't it a legitimate matter of pride 
 that France, as a nation and as a people, has 
 made herself so dear to the affections of the 
 world, and the cause for which she stands so 
 just, that twenty gover.ments have ranged them- 
 selves beside her, so that even though Paris be 
 taken, even though the army of France be wiped 
 
 194 J
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 out, Germany would have no chance to win, 
 for all the United States will come over before 
 that can happen. 
 
 1 sometimes wonder if it is possible for you 
 to understand just what it means to be French 
 to-day ? The men from the States, great as 
 their sacrifice is, leave their women and children 
 in security. The men of France, standing out 
 there in that battle-line, have not that comfort, 
 for, while they are offering their lives for the 
 cause, right over their heads the enemy is send- 
 ing death to their very firesides. Startling idea, 
 isn t it r 
 
 Our roads are full of moving artillery — 
 Americans passing everywhere, and the enthusi- 
 asm for them grows every day. 
 
 The heavy artillery was very noisy at noon. 
 But we are so used to that that we are nervous 
 without it. When we don't hear it every one 
 here thinks nothing is doing, and that in spite 
 of the fact that we all know the present battle 
 is a battle of movement, an infantry battle, the 
 sort of battle in which the French are most at 
 home. 
 
 It looks to-night as if Compiegne were safe, 
 although it has suffered badly from the artillery 
 fire. Do you remember the last day we were 
 there, and lunched at the handsome new hotel at 
 the entrance of the forest, with its wide verandah 
 and its awnings — so much more English than 
 French — and how we drove through the forest 
 to take tea at Pierrefonds ? I remember it 
 was a hunts day, and every little way, down 
 
 *95
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 the long vistas of trees, we saw the huntsmen 
 dashing across, and heard the horns. It is a 
 lovely memory. Though the town is so badly 
 hurt, we are told the palace, with its souvenirs 
 of Napoleon III, has been spared by order of 
 the Kaiser, as it was there he planned to make 
 his last rest on the route to Paris, to put on 
 his white uniform de -parade, and take his auto- 
 mobile for the fortifications, where his war-horse 
 was to wait him and carry him into Paris, and 
 through the Arc de Triomphe — another of those 
 illusions already twice destroyed, since he waited 
 outside Nancy, ready to enter. It has been a 
 close shave each time, but " a miss is as good 
 as a mile." 
 
 196
 
 XXVI 
 
 June 22, 1 9 1 8 
 
 Things have not changed much since I wrote 
 you. The battle seems for the moment stationary, 
 but we all know that it is only held up until the 
 Germans can reorganize another coup. As that 
 of March 2ist extended from Cherizy to the 
 forest of Coucy, and that of May 27th along the 
 tragic Chemin des Dames, from the defences of 
 Soissons to Reims and across the Marne the 
 other side of Chateau-Thierry, about thirty miles 
 from us, we are unusually nervous right here as 
 to the direction of the next attack. If it should 
 be in the direction of Meaux it would be all up 
 with us. 
 
 By a strange chance it is on the sector which 
 includes Chateau-Thierry that the boys from the 
 States are holding the line and holding it bravely 
 - — brilliantly. Isn't it odd to think that while 
 they are all along the line it should be at the 
 point where an advance would menace my house 
 that the " boys from home " should be doing their 
 most conspicuous work ? The people about me 
 are really sentimental on the subject. You would 
 think, from their attitude, that I had especially 
 ordered the arrangement. Perhaps I will be 
 mobbed if they don't hold on ! 
 
 197
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 We hear the guns intermittently. There is an 
 almost daily movement of American troops over 
 the route to Meaux. I do not see them. We have 
 been dealt three air raids since I last wrote, and 
 now, as we nave a tir de barrage from five points 
 in an arc about us, the noise of the guns of 
 defence is terrible. 
 
 Almost every day a new group of refugees 
 arrive. We have a large number from Acy, 
 near Soissons, and within a mile or two of Sarches, 
 where the Englishwomen who used to be at 
 Meaux, and of whom I think I wrote you, went 
 last fall to organize a big foyer. Somehow, in all 
 the excitement of the last month, it was not until 
 the people from Acy arrived that I realized that, 
 of course, the big foyer at Sarches must have been 
 destroyed. 
 
 It was. 
 
 A week ago last Tuesday they surprised me by 
 walking into the garden. They had come over 
 from Meaux, where they stopped in the retreat, 
 to help in the hospital, where they were short of 
 nurses. I am afraid they were surprised when 
 they found me here. They insisted that I was 
 not to stay, that the Americans at Meaux sent 
 word that, if I were still here, I was to be told 
 that I was " crazy to stay." 
 
 They had passed through a terrible experience, 
 seeing all they had organized so well, and all they 
 had collected and arranged — libraries, music- 
 rooms, tennis-courts, dear little houses and gar- 
 dens — destroyed, and had made a tragic retreat 
 over roads full of empty gun-carriages, flying 
 
 198
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 women and children, retreating soldiers, exploding 
 ammunition as the retiring army destroyed its 
 stores to prevent the Germans from getting what 
 could not be carried. They arrived, nerve-tired, 
 at Meaux to go right into the crowded hospital, 
 just in time (they were on night service) to stand 
 to their posts when the air raid on the morning 
 of the 3rd of June did such damage only a short 
 distance from the ambulance. It was no wonder 
 that they were a bit pessimistic about our chances 
 here. They were sweetly sympathetic about the 
 house and my library, and wanted me to make an 
 effort to get military automobiles to come and 
 take away my treasures before it was too late. 
 
 But for that I had no ambition. Military auto- 
 mobiles have too much work to do which is more 
 important, and 1 thought it would be time enough, 
 if ever, when we were warned to get out. 
 
 "But you will get no warning," they ex- 
 claimed ; " if you wait for that it will be too 
 late." 
 
 But my mind was made up. I have often 
 wondered what would become of all the stuff I 
 have collected about me when I have done with 
 it. Don't you remember, even in the old days 
 before I came out here, I used to laugh about it 
 with you ? A poor person's library, got together 
 haphazard, is like one's collection of friends — no 
 one else wants it. I'd hate the idea of its being 
 sold, and turning, up for years after in the dusty 
 boxes on the quais, as I have, in my time, found 
 the books of others. Well, if it were to go up 
 in the smoke, as my sacrifice for the victory, I 
 
 199
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 shan.'t care. In fact, it will be a fine end, and 
 settle one anxiety in my mind. 
 
 They insisted so much about, at least, my 
 leaving that I was glad to be able to tell them 
 that I was going to Paris next day, and I did not 
 tell them that I was coming directly back — but 
 I did. 
 
 I was glad I went, for 1 had a most interesting 
 trip, and saw thousands of our boys. I don't see 
 much of them unless I do move about a bit, for 
 they just rush by here to Chateau-Thierry. 
 
 I went up last Friday. On the route de Meaux, 
 as I drove down to the station, I found the road 
 simply full of camion-loads of the boys from home. 
 As Ninette walked slowly along the line, I leaned 
 out to call my greeting to the boys in English. 
 I wish you could have seen their smiling faces. 
 It took Ninette half an hour to go from the top 
 of the hill down to the station, and I did my best 
 to give them a solo acclamation all the way, and 
 they returned the compliment. 
 
 As my train ran into Esbly, we passed car-load 
 after car-load, side-tracked outside the station, all 
 in their shirt-sleeves, sitting in the cattle-cars 
 which carry the French troops, eating their break- 
 fast in picnic fashion. I longed to run back down 
 the track to greet them, but I had not time, so I 
 bought up all the English papers I could get — a 
 few Paris Heralds and Daily Mails — and sent 
 them down by the station-master, who was only 
 too glad to make the trip. 
 
 The excitement in the station was intense. 
 Every one was crowded on the end of the plat- 
 
 200
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 form from which the train-load of Americans 
 could be seen. You would have thought, from 
 their air, that the war would be over day after 
 to-morrow. You should have seen their faces 
 and heard the tone of their voices when they 
 spoke of " ces braves garcons de V Amerique" I 
 told you at the time that war was declared in 
 Washington that -we were a lucky people. Our 
 boys have come over to cast the deciding vote in 
 a long-tied struggle. They are going to get 
 credit for that decision. Please God they'll play 
 up to the enthusiasm there is for them, — and 
 modestly do full justice to the great sacrifices 
 which have prepared the road for them. 
 
 It is lucky that in these days I rarely read in 
 the train — the road is too interesting — otherwise 
 I should have missed seeing the groups of lads 
 from the States bivouacked all along the line, 
 lying on the banks or grouped about eating. I 
 rode most of the way at the open window, waving 
 my greetings, and they not only always waved 
 back as cordially as if they had known I was a 
 fellow-citizen, but often rose to their feet to do it. 
 
 I found Paris quiet, — it was the 15th, and the 
 big gun had ceased firing on the 12th, and there 
 had been no air raids for nine nights. But on 
 Sunday night there was a terrible one, in which 
 there were lives lost and a big fire started. It 
 began at twenty minutes after eleven and lasted 
 until one o'clock — long enough to spoil the night. 
 
 On the train Monday I read the news that the 
 big offensive for Venice had begun, so there is 
 one more cause for hourly suspense, but the 
 
 201
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 worst seemed to be over in three days — this time 
 the Italians are holding. 
 
 The weather has been queer. For a month 
 here we had practically no rain, and everything is 
 drying up. My lawn is a pitiful sight, but that 
 is no matter. What does matter are the potatoes 
 and beans. 
 
 Last night we had a most remarkable sunset. 
 I never saw anything at all like it, or anything of 
 the sort that was so strangely beautiful. The 
 western horizon was like the flames of a huge fire 
 — copper and gold with a background of sullen 
 red. From the point where the sun was sinking 
 started broad clouds like banners, extending in 
 even rays, like the spokes of a wheel, up to the 
 zenith and paling down to the east. These cloud 
 rays were almost white on one edge and blackish 
 gray on the other. They were even in width, 
 and as evenly spaced as if done with a compass, 
 and they curved with the dome of the heavens. 
 Every one was out on the hill to watch the 
 spectacle, and if I had seen it in a picture and not 
 with my own eyes, I could not have believed it to 
 be a true bill. 
 
 202
 
 XXVII 
 
 June 29, 191 8 
 
 I got up this morning feeling as if I had never 
 had a trouble in the world. All my nervousness 
 had disappeared in the night. I'd like to think 
 that it presages something remarkable. I am 
 afraid it only means that I slept from ten to six 
 without budging, — which is unusual. You can 
 guess how sound my sleep was when I tell you 
 that there was a raid last night, and I never 
 heard it. I am generally a light sleeper. I never 
 expected to arrive at sleeping through a bombard- 
 ment. But I have. So it may be that I am 
 getting used to it. I am willing, for it's small 
 service I can render listening to the racket. I 
 can't stop the bombs, nor bring down the Gothas, 
 though if wishing it on them would accomplish it 
 they would long ago have been all annihilated. 
 
 It has been rather a busy and picturesque week. 
 
 Last Sunday — that was the 23rd — we had the 
 304th dragoons camped here for the night — the 
 very biggest cantonnement we have ever had, and 
 I had the Captain in the house. 
 
 They arrived at six o'clock, and it was one of 
 the hottest days I ever saw. They had been in 
 the saddle since four in the morning. 
 
 The quartermaster and a couple of corporals 
 
 203
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 had been here all day preparing the cantonnement. 
 We had eighty horses in the little railed-in pasture 
 on the top of the hill, which we never thought 
 was too big for Ninette and Bijou, and fifty in the 
 smaller one where we used to put the goat. These 
 two little pares, as Pere calls them, are on either 
 side of the devise, a bit of City of Paris land 
 following the line of the Paris water conduits 
 from the Ourcq to Paris, and across it runs a foot- 
 path, always kept clear, which is barred at regular 
 distances so that it resembles a hurdle-course, 
 though it is only for pedestrians. 
 
 I never had such respect or understanding for 
 the tremendous work required to keep an army 
 going as I had while I watched that regiment 
 arrange itself just for this etape of ten hours. 
 Every one knew just what to do. In less than 
 an hour after the head of the line came into the 
 courtyard at Pere's where the kitchens and big 
 commissary wagons were set up, all was in order. 
 
 I sat on a big stone beside the road and, while 
 the horses were being led in a line to the watering- 
 troughs, I saw the speed with which posts four 
 feet high attached with heavy cords were driven 
 into the ground some ten feet apart along both 
 sides of the footpath. To these posts such of the 
 horses as could not be stabled or put into our little 
 enclosures, were attached by their halters. It 
 took almost less time than it takes me to write it 
 for saddles to be removed, nose-bags to be adjusted, 
 and there, close around the four sides of the en- 
 closures, and almost shoulder to shoulder down 
 either side of the footpath, the horses ate, while 
 
 204
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 saddles were being inspected and piled in regular 
 heaps in the centre of the enclosure and against 
 the barriers on the outside. Every one was busy, 
 there was plenty of blague falling about, but no one 
 seemed to get into any one's way, and by nine 
 o'clock everybody was eating. 
 
 My ! but it takes lots to feed them. They 
 threw whole beeves out of the big camion — an old 
 Paris tram-car, if you please, with windows re- 
 placed by wire screenings, inside which the beef 
 and mutton hung up just as it does at the butcher's 
 — while whole kegs of beer had a camion of their 
 own, and the vegetable kettles were almost as big 
 as barrels. 
 
 While the dinner was preparing, and a huge 
 dish of eggs which it took two men to carry was 
 being cooked in my kitchen, the men washed up 
 wherever they could find a place. I suppose you 
 have heard that the poilu never washes unless 
 he has to. It is a standard joke. There are 
 exceptions. You ought to have seen the court 
 at Amelie's, and what I sarcastically call my basse 
 cour. 
 
 Long ago, when I thought I'd raise geese — I 
 never told you about that, perhaps ? — one of my 
 follies — for lack of a brook I bought a huge, flat, 
 round bath-tub. It was a metre and a half in 
 diameter. When I gave up raising geese the tub 
 was put in the tool-house, and there it stood on 
 end. The poilus found it. Just as I was coming 
 through the long garden at Amelie's, which runs 
 beside the chickens' home, with only a high 
 grillage between, a loud voice warned me with : 
 
 205
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 " Attention. Defense cTentrer. Salle de bain privee" 
 and I got through the gate in time to avoid a 
 study in the nude. Amelie explained when I got 
 through that they were sprinkling one another in 
 the tub with the big watering-pot. 
 
 They were still eating when I went to bed. 
 
 As I closed up for the night I thought to myself, 
 "It is dollars to doughnuts that the Gothas will 
 come to-night." And just before eleven they did, 
 and the barrage was not silent until midnight. 
 
 Amelie told me in the morning that the boys 
 simply put out their lights, and finished cleaning 
 and repacking in the dark. 
 
 Just imagine how much actual work all this 
 means, when I tell you that at three o'clock the 
 next morning they were up and at work, and at 
 half-past three they were in the saddle, and the 
 long line of cavalry and the big commissary 
 wagons and the ammunition train, with its mule- 
 drawn mitrailleuses^ were trotting and rattling on 
 the road again, 
 
 We had one day's rest and then the 102nd 
 artillery came in for the same sort of a repose. It 
 was a different kind of cantonnement^ of course, as 
 there were no horses except those of the officers ; 
 everything else — men, cannon, ammunition, equip- 
 ment — was carried on camions and in lorries. But 
 the little road in front of my house has never been 
 so picturesque. All along that road from the 
 turn above the well at Amelie's to that below 
 where it goes into Voisins, in front of Made- 
 moiselle Henriette's, a line of camions carrying 
 guns was drawn up, and in the open space in front 
 
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 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 of my gate the ammunition wagons were simply 
 packed. In this etape there were no kitchens and 
 no commissary. The men each carried one day's 
 rations, and the officers rode down to the hotel 
 at Couilly to dine. 
 
 1 thought, as I looked out of my bedroom 
 window that night, " La ! la ! if the Gothas get 
 this to-night they will make a mess." But they 
 did not. And before daylight the next day they 
 were off. 
 
 We are still waiting for some sign of the next 
 movement at the front, and of course all this 
 military activity means something. 
 
 The artillery had hardly got away when news 
 came that the 21st dragoons were coming in, and 
 while I was talking to the Captain's orderly, who 
 was arranging the officers' quarters here, and I was 
 explaining the kitchen to the cook — for four 
 officers were to eat in the house — I got a telegram 
 from Paris telling me to come up without delay, 
 as I was wanted at the Embassy. So I had just 
 time to welcome the Captain as he rode in, and 
 catch the noon train. 
 
 I went directly to the Embassy, where 1 was 
 informed that, at the request of the French Govern- 
 ment, all strangers were being asked to leave Paris 
 as well as the war zone. The explanation given 
 was that while no one thought it possible that the 
 Germans could get to Paris, it was possible — per- 
 haps probable — that Paris would be bombarded. 
 As far as I was personally concerned they con- 
 sidered my situation untenable, as even a slight 
 advance on the Marne would bring me within 
 
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 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 fifteen miles of the firing line, where I would be 
 an embarrassment to the army — in fact, though 
 they put it more politely, a nuisance. All my 
 papers had to be examined and vised, and I had 
 to select a place to go, which was properly written 
 against my name in the list of Americans allowed, 
 in the last combing out, to remain in France, and 
 then I was told that, as 1 lived in the zone des 
 armees, and travelled at the pleasure of the Fifth 
 Army Corps, I would have to go to the French 
 bureau which controlled circulation on the railroads, 
 and get a French vise. 
 
 Before we left the house we had agreed that 
 if it became necessary to leave the town we would 
 go to Versailles, as a first etape. It is outside the 
 fortifications to the south-west, and in case of 
 need it would be easier to retreat west from there 
 than from the city proper. Of course what the 
 authorities are really trying to do is to avoid the 
 possibility of a panic at the railway stations at 
 the last minute in case the town is bombarded. 
 There are plenty of people who will not take 
 this warning seriously, but a great number will, 
 and the fewer people there are in the city the 
 better. 
 
 The passport department had been crowded. 
 It was evident that they were combing people out 
 carefully. I had only escaped hours of waiting 
 on the stairs by being discovered by an old Boston 
 friend who needed a witness to swear to her 
 identity. But, even with that advantage, which 
 admitted me long before my turn, the process 
 was a long one, and my papers were examined by 
 
 208
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 at least six men before I escaped and pushed my 
 way downstairs through the waiting crowd. I had 
 been telegraphed for by a friend as we were called 
 alphabetically. 
 
 From the Embassy I went to the French bureau 
 on the rue de Rivoli. There I found the waiting 
 line extending down the street and round the 
 corner, and at that hour of the day the sun shines 
 right into the colonnade. There I stood in the 
 heat, in a pushing line, for an hour before my turn 
 came to even enter the building. When I finally 
 got in and found my proper man, I was told that 
 my papers were in perfect order, that I could go 
 to Versailles whenever I desired. And I was told 
 that the sooner 1 left Paris the better. I took 
 the advice forty-eight hours later, but I did not 
 go to Versailles, I came back here. I tell you 
 all this just to show you what it is like to be 
 here now. There is an even chance either way, 
 that's all. 
 
 I stayed in town Wednesday and Thursday 
 night, and came home yesterday. On both nights 
 there was a bad air raid. That on Wednesday 
 destroyed a big shop which we both know, and 
 that on Thursday was the noisiest I have heard 
 since March, and one of the most destructive. It 
 began at half-past nine and lasted until midnight, 
 and the bombs seemed to be distributed over a 
 wide area. Just as in the big March raid I had 
 happened, by accident, on one of the bombarded 
 regions, so yesterday morning I went through 
 another on my way to the station — the Place 
 Vend6me. But all the damage I could see was 
 p 209
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 a terrible destruction of window glass. There 
 was hardly a whole pane in the square. 
 
 On arriving at Couilly I found the road up 
 the hill full of ammunition camions, and Ninette 
 climbed up with the huge camions full of big obus 
 crawling by. I own to have felt foolishly nervous 
 as they jerked slowly along. I felt as if, should 
 one backslide or topple over, I should see Kingdom- 
 come before this cruel war was over. Of course 
 I knew they wouldn't, but we have had some 
 queer accidents on that road since the great activity 
 which has never ceased began on May 26th. 
 
 I found the 21st dragoons had gone. Amelie 
 said they had seemed very happy — the officers — 
 and I imagine they had a better time than if I had 
 been at home, for they had the freedom of the 
 house and no fear that they were putting its 
 mistress out. Amelie said they did not leave the 
 garden at all — that they read and played cards 
 and wrote and chatted all day, and had their 
 coffee out on the lawn ; but I found a little note, 
 tucked into the drawer in the salon table, from 
 the Captain, saying : 
 
 "Please read here the cordial thanks and 
 respectful homages of a Captain who was bitterly 
 disappointed that his charming hostess, as soon 
 as he had set eyes on her, disappeared." 
 
 Really, aren't they wonderful ? It is not only 
 that they feel the necessity to do that sort of thing, 
 but that they are so unconscious and do it so well, 
 and sign it all up with their names and rank. 
 
 I told you that I was feeling very chipper when 
 I began this, and I am. I wish I knew why. It 
 
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 is not only that ; I simply ordered Amelie this 
 morning to set my house in order. I don't care 
 how many people she gets to help her. It must 
 be done at once. She argues that since things are 
 put away they may as well stay until we are sure 
 of the next move, but I say " No," and when I 
 say it loud like that I am always obeyed. 
 
 Besides, just to show you how well I feel, 1 
 have decided to go to Paris both for the Fourth 
 and the Fourteenth of July. Paris is going to 
 make our Independence Day a national fete, and 
 on the Fourteenth I shall know that somewhere 
 you will be watching the States celebrating 
 Bastille Day at the same time that I am standing 
 somewhere in Paris cheering the Allies. Well, of 
 course, not exactly that, because really I shall be 
 in the streets while you are still sleeping at two 
 in the morning, and I shall be at tea when you 
 see your procession start, but that's not important. 
 The Allied spirit of the thing is what matters. 
 This is a great decision for me. You know how I 
 hate a crowd. But there will be few more things 
 of this sort left for me, and I do feel that perhaps 
 this is the first scene in the last act. You see how 
 very much on the right side of the bed I got out 
 this morning. 
 
 211
 
 XXVIII 
 
 July 12, 1918 
 
 Well, I can tell you this is dry season. If it 
 were important I should grieve over my garden. 
 You should see my dahlias. I don't ask them to 
 be superb until later, but they never came up in 
 such a state as they have this year. The slugs 
 ate them as fast as they came out of the ground, 
 in spite of the fact that, armed with the tongs, I 
 picked them up carefully twice a day. Such dirty 
 slimy things, all sizes and all colours, from little 
 pale white things and ditto black up to big fat 
 yellow fellows and ditto brown, with horrid heads 
 like seals and bulging eyes, which they draw in 
 and close when you touch them. In spite of all 
 that hard and disagreeable work the first leaves 
 were all eaten and the first buds to open are 
 small, because of the lack of water, and worse than 
 that, they are half eaten away by the slugs. But 
 never mind, I had the fun of playing at garden- 
 ing, and now I can busy myself doctoring them. 
 We have had every variety of weather this week. 
 It was piping hot on Sunday, it blew hard on 
 Tuesday, was clear and sunny like an autumn day 
 on Wednesday, it showered on Thursday, it 
 opened and shut on Friday, it pours to-day. 
 Variety, anyway. In spite of the terrible drought 
 
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 of which the farmers complain with reason, and 
 which has dwarfed all my posies and scorched my 
 lawn yellow, the grain looks well, and I have never 
 heard the larks sing as they sing these mornings 
 and evenings, as 1 watch them mounting and 
 mounting, their rippling notes falling out of the 
 clouds long after the bird is invisible. And there 
 are so many finches. There is one who sits and 
 gives a real concert on the ridge-pole of the house 
 every day, and 1 am just as nice an audience as I 
 know for him — always with an eye that Khaki 
 does not sneak up there, for I suspect Khaki and 
 doubt if he makes any distinction between birds 
 that sing and birds that don't, when he goes 
 a-hunting. 
 
 You ask me if the winter is going to be a hard 
 one. Well, to tell you the truth, except that I 
 know that it is to be another winter with the army 
 " out there," I have not thought much about it. 
 Anyway, what were hardships for four winters 
 will not be so bad this winter, because I am used 
 to them, and expect nothing else. I am getting 
 in wood every day. It is easier to get it than it 
 has been in the previous war years, and 1 am 
 buying it everywhere, and shall as long as I can 
 find any place to put it. What the army is going 
 to say I don't know, for there is a board on my 
 gate which announces billets for one officer and 
 twenty men, and I am afraid my wood is filling 
 up the soldiers' bedrooms. But I suppose we'll 
 find some way out of it. Perhaps the army will 
 settle it by taking my wood away. 
 
 We have heard the artillery at the front almost 
 
 213
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 every day since I last wrote to you, but the news- 
 papers say nothing which explains. The soldiers, 
 going through, say " Don't worry. All is going 
 well. In eight days you can expect to get good 
 news," and that has to content us for the present. 
 
 On Monday of last week we had an air raid, 
 which began at quarter before eleven and lasted 
 until nearly two the next morning — that was the 
 first day of this month — and the next morning, at 
 half-past seven, while I was in the garden, there 
 was a heavy tir de barrage, but it appeared to be 
 directed to the protection of Meaux, though it 
 was impossible to be sure, in spite of my hearing 
 the Boche machine distinctly. As spent shot 
 began to rattle on the roof, 1 thought it prudent 
 to take to cover. 
 
 The next day I went up to Paris to pass the 
 Fourth, as I wrote you I should. Before I left I 
 made sure that our two communes and Huiry itself 
 had American flags, and left Amelie to fling the 
 Stars and Stripes to the French breezes over the 
 gate here and under the bedroom windows, and 
 on the road side of her house. That is all the 
 fete there will be here, but it is enough. 
 
 The Fourth was a lovely day. Every one had 
 anticipated, and even the papers had not hesitated 
 to say, that it was more than likely that the 
 Boches would consider the national fete-day of the 
 States, to be gloriously celebrated in the streets of 
 the French capital, as a legitimate opportunity to 
 bring into play again their long-distance cannon. 
 But the Kaiser, if he expected that possibility 
 would keep any one from going into the streets 
 
 214
 
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 to see the boys from the States march down the 
 Champs-Elysees, had another disappointment. 
 
 We had no desire to hear the discourses nor to 
 see the statesmen sitting in the official tribunes — 
 the former we could read later, and the latter 
 were an eld story. We had instead a desire to 
 see the crowd in the street and the movement and 
 watch the reception of the troops at various points 
 of the short march from Washington's monument 
 at the head of the newly christened Avenue 
 President Wilson to the Strasbourg monument on 
 the Place de la Concorde. 
 
 The streets in the vicinity of the line of march 
 were crowded, and everywhere, even in the quiet 
 and deserted streets of the other quarters, were 
 the American flags. There was no shop too small 
 to show one. Bonnes on the way to market had the 
 Stars and Stripes on their market baskets. Every 
 taxi-cab was decorated with the flag, and so was 
 every decrepit old sapin. It floated on the tram- 
 cars and the omnibuses, it hung out of almost every 
 window, and at the entrance of the big apartment 
 houses, already closed but for the presence of the 
 concierge. Crippled soldiers distributed tiny flags 
 on all the streets. We took ours, two steps from 
 the door, from a one-legged chasseur Alpin, who 
 ran about on his peg as lively as a cricket, and as 
 gay — only twenty-two he told me, three years' 
 service stripes on his sleeve, and a croix de guerre 
 and medaille militaire on his breast, and he laughed 
 in my face when I looked grave as he pinned a 
 flag on me, and remarked, " Don't you mind, I'm 
 not done with them yet ; '" and away he hopped 
 
 2I 5
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 across the street to pin an American flag on some 
 one else. 
 
 We took a cab and drove along the line look- 
 ing, from our higher elevation, over the heads of 
 the crowds behind each barrier, as no one could 
 approach without a ticket to within a block in any 
 direction of the grand stand — there was only one. 
 My object was to see the cortege passing down 
 the Champ-filysees from the Rond Point to the 
 Place de la Concorde. So we drove to the 
 Avenue Gabriel, and, close to the garden entrance 
 to the Presidential residence we got out and 
 walked across the garden between the Ambas- 
 sadeurs and the Alcazar, now given up to the 
 American work for the aid of the French wounded. 
 You remember just the place, for I know we went 
 there to dine together ten years ago. You re- 
 member ? We sat at a table in the balcony just 
 opposite the stage, and had what you called " the 
 best table d'hote dinner for the price " you had 
 ever eaten, and watched a good variety show — or 
 at least I did. I remember that you were more 
 interested in the women walking about in the 
 couloirs, and the wonderful clothes. Alas ! those 
 days are gone. 
 
 On arriving near the Avenue some one helped 
 me mount on to a bench, where, over the heads 
 of the throng massed at the curb, I could look 
 up and down the Avenue, with an American 
 aviator, in a Liberty machine, doing stunts over 
 my head just above the tree-tops, and I assure 
 you I had my heart in my mouth most of the 
 time. 
 
 216
 
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 The crowd that packed the line of march was 
 almost as picturesque as the procession. As far 
 as the French went it was, of course, largely 
 women, children, and white-haired men, with a 
 sprinkling of poilus on leave, convalescent soldiers 
 — the crippled soldiers had a reserved stand near 
 the head of the route — and a great number of 
 English and American men in khaki — the Red 
 Cross and Y.M.C.A. units, the commissary men, 
 who have their headquarters in the Avenue, and a 
 sprinkling of uniforms of all the nations in arms. 
 The shouts and cheers went up in waves as the 
 cortege started far away, but in the Avenue itself 
 only began when the head of the line appeared 
 preceded by the band. Then the cries of " Vivent 
 les Americains" " Vivent nos Allies" were cut with 
 the " Hip, hip, hurrah ! " of the Americans, and 
 it culminated when the division of the Marines, 
 in their battle-stained uniforms, their soiled but 
 trim knapsacks on their backs, and their battered 
 " tin hats " (the boys who cleared the Bois de 
 Belleau), came into sight. I thought then that 
 the kind of crowd which was gathered that day 
 could not make any more noise than they made 
 for the Americans, who, with their guns on their 
 shoulders, marched as steadily as veterans, though 
 their faces were the faces of boys. But I was 
 mistaken, for, with a fine spirit that I loved, they 
 had justly reserved their most ardent acclamations 
 for their own war-worn troops, and the shouts of 
 " Vivent nos poilus ," " Vive la France" were as near 
 hysterical as anything I have seen in France since 
 the war began. I saw women laughing and crying 
 
 217
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 at the same time, and only able to wave their 
 hands in greeting. 
 
 After it was all over, we found our taxi again 
 and drove back up the Avenue. It looked so gay, 
 with the crowds laughing and chatting and flowers 
 everywhere. Paris had needed to see its armies 
 and cheer the boys from the front. It did them 
 more visible good than all the heroic talk can ever 
 do. I know it did me. 
 
 I had loved seeing so many of our boys, not 
 only in the procession, but the crowd in the street. 
 I love seeing — good soldiers as they are proving 
 themselves — how little they stand on ceremony in 
 private life. The officers nod to one another 
 instead of saluting. A common soldier or a 
 corporal says " Hulloa, old man," to his lieutenant, 
 with whom he probably went to school. Even 
 in public an officer will sometimes stand uncovered 
 as he talks in the street to a girl friend. It is 
 only something so solemn as the passing of the 
 colours that brings the American boy erect, his 
 heels together, his shoulders squared, his hand at 
 just the proper angle of salute, and when it is 
 over, he slaps his hand on his leg in real regimental 
 fashion — and limbers up to the characteristic 
 American slouch again. 
 
 I remarked to an American officer one day, as 
 he lifted his hat to greet me, that he was most 
 unmilitary, and his reply was : a Hell ! We 
 American soldiers are only camoufied civilians ; " 
 and that is terribly true, added to which they have 
 not worn a uniform long enough to be unconscious 
 in playing the role of a soldier. 
 
 2l8
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 In spite of all the expectations of an attack of 
 some sort, the big cannon made no sign, and 
 there was no air raid that night. 
 
 I came back on the sixth, which was last 
 Saturday. I had hardly got my hat and coat off 
 when a French officer arrived at my gate to 
 arrange for the cantonnement here of the American 
 boys coming out from the secteur at Chateau- 
 Thierry — lads who fought at Bois de Belleau. 
 You should have seen the face of the young 
 American sergeant when I addressed him in English 
 and told him that I was an American. I don't 
 know which of us was the most excited. 
 
 The French officer, who spoke no English and 
 depended on me to help him out, told me that 
 there were seven Americans here to arrange the 
 cantonnement for fifteen hundred — a Town Major, 
 a quartermaster, and a few corporals and sergeants, 
 and that the rest were expected Monday morning. 
 They were coming by road, marching on foot, 
 and expected to take two days, in fact they were 
 supposed to have already " come out." They 
 are to rest a few days and go up to Paris the 
 morning of the Fourteenth, to be decorated — 
 the Marines won their fourraghe in the Bois de 
 Belleau — and to march in the procession. 
 
 The weather was terribly hot, so when Monday 
 came and went and there was no sign of the 
 American Marines every one was as disappointed 
 as I was, but we all explained it by the intense 
 heat, which would make marching nearly forty 
 miles no joke to tired soldiers just out of a battle. 
 But Tuesday and Wednesday passed, and the 
 
 219
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 advance guard of the battalion who had arrived 
 here with only three days' rations began to worry 
 a little. They were getting a new kind of taste 
 of war. In the meantime they drifted round one 
 after another to see me, play the phonograph and 
 chat. I am afraid they were rather bored. They 
 spoke little French, though they got on well with 
 the French, and they had guard duty to do, and 
 the Town Major kept strict discipline. But here 
 it is Friday night, and I am leaving for Paris 
 to-morrow to see the celebration of the Fourteenth. 
 I do want to see the armies of all the Allies in 
 the Avenue du Bois, otherwise I would not go 
 until the Americans have come and are comfortably 
 settled. 
 
 Amelie is not at all content. She is afraid that 
 she cannot properly replace me. She has made 
 me write a note in English which she is to show 
 any American soldier who comes to the door. 
 It is just a line saying that they are welcome and 
 are to consider the house as "a little piece of 
 home," and make themselves comfortable accord- 
 ingly. She stood over me while I wrote it on a 
 big sheet of paper, imploring me to write it " very 
 large and very distinct," which shows you what 
 Amelie thinks of my handwriting. She has 
 pinned it on the blotter. She knows how to 
 say " cum een," and I can imagine her taking 
 them by the sleeve, and leading them up to the 
 desk to read the proclamation. She has made 
 me write " Mildred Aldrich, American," as a 
 signature. 
 
 By the way, Amelie's English does not march 
 
 220
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 very rapidly. She can still say " I spek Engleesh 
 vairee veil, oh yees." She says they understand 
 her, but she does not get their reply, and is 
 disappointed when I am not by to hear and tell 
 her what they said. She has also learned to say 
 " Got cigarette ? " with a strong interrogatory 
 inflection. You see Amelie loves her cigarette, 
 but she does not like Egyptians, the only thing 
 available just now, when the ordinary French 
 cigarette is not sold to civilians. That works 
 very well. The boys understand, and if they 
 have a cigarette they give it to her. But they 
 more often have a pipe and tobacco. I have told 
 Amelie that she must not do this, as the boys 
 have none too much tobacco for themselves, and 
 I thought I had broken her of it. But the other 
 day there was an officer calling and she went out 
 to look at his big car and admire the chauffeur — 
 she thought him so chic — and I heard her getting 
 off her " Got cigarette ? " When he had gone I 
 reproached her, and she looked grieved as she 
 explained that she did not want his cigarettes — 
 besides, he did not have any. When I desired to 
 know why she had taken the trouble to ask if she 
 did not want any she replied : " Histoire de parler 
 anglais ! " 
 
 I thought that was lovely. 
 
 I have an idea that the American Marines are 
 not coming at all. There is a tremendous activity 
 everywhere about us. You know, now, since the 
 Germans reached the Marne again, we are not only 
 zone des armees but we are arriere front, and never 
 since the war began has the military movement 
 
 221
 
 .THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 about us been so constant. There are hours 
 of the day when we simply cannot drive on our 
 roads at all. All this means something, and, 
 although I am going up to see the first real war 
 celebration of the Fourteenth, I am going with a 
 feeling that if something does not happen while 
 I am gone, something will all the same happen 
 soon. 
 
 You realize, of course, that the next move 
 settles our fate here. So long as the Germans 
 hold Soissons Paris is menaced, so long as they 
 hold Chateau-Thierry the Marne valley is open 
 to them. In either case our situation is critical. 
 If the next move sees the Germans not only held, 
 but pushed back, all danger to us here is, I am 
 convinced, ended for ever. 
 
 But whichever way it turns is only locally 
 important. Even if Paris is taken, even if it 
 were possible to wipe out the French army, 
 Germany's situation would not be changed and 
 never will be until she has wiped out the States. 
 But every time I think about it the condition of 
 France seems to me the more remarkable — all 
 her men in the war or in war-works, all the rescued 
 population of the invaded districts from the 
 frontier to the Somme and the Marne crowded 
 into the south and west, and millions of Allied 
 soldiers from other countries, with thousands of 
 Red Cross workers of all sorts, and hundreds of 
 thousands of German prisoners, and here we are 
 trying to lead a normal life, and coming precious 
 near to doing it. And strangest of all, the 
 majority of the people are more sane and happier 
 
 222
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 than they have ever been. It is a great disaster. 
 Of course it is. But we are all terribly alive, and 
 it is not at such epochs that the world ever bothers 
 itself to write symposiums on " Is Life Worth 
 Living ? ", or speculates about " La Lutte pour la 
 Vie." 
 
 Thanks for the newspaper clipping containing 
 the pen portrait of me sitting on the wheelbarrow 
 on the platform of the railway station at Esbly, 
 on the day I went to Paris to carry my trunk, 
 " with tears in my voice if not in my eyes." I 
 am afraid that touch was the pretty young 
 journalist's poetic licence — she was pretty, you 
 know. I am sorry the picture struck you as 
 " pitiful and pathetic." I really am. Come now, 
 what would you have had me do, sitting there 
 among that crowd of women leading children by 
 one hand and lugging such of their poor effects 
 as they had saved ? You surely could not have 
 expected that 1 would do a song and dance simply 
 because, up to date, my home was safe. I was sad. 
 How could I have been anything else ? Only a 
 few hours before I had seen a poor flying woman 
 carrying a dead baby in her arms, and among 
 other objects of my journey to Paris was a visit 
 to the American Red Cross to beg some layettes 
 for newborn babies in our commune — emigrees of 
 course — and stuff to make underclothes for 
 women and children who had arrived with only 
 what they had on their backs, for in that retreat 
 of over thirty miles, from Noyon to Chateau- 
 Thierry, between May 27 and June 4, these 
 poor people were taken by surprise and had no 
 
 223
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 time to save more than their skins and what 
 covered them. Will that explain the "tears in 
 my voice " if they were there ? 
 
 You ask me for news of Mademoiselle 
 Henriette. Is it possible that in all the excitement 
 of the days since the retreat of March 2 1 I forgot 
 to tell you that she had gone ? She is at 
 Salonica. She left here in March — the very first 
 if I remember. Anyway I have looked up her 
 first note — a post-card — from Toulon, dated 
 March 3, in which she says : 
 
 " We sail to-morrow. It is Sunday, and I 
 have just attended mass on deck. It was pretty 
 and very impressive. Standing in the midst of 
 officers, soldiers and sailors, I had once more the 
 illusion that I too was on active service, and felt 
 once more at home. We are sailing without 
 escort, under the protection simply of the Red 
 Cross, although we have on board a neutral — an 
 officer of the Spanish navy." 
 
 Odd that I should have forgotten to tell you 
 this at the time. She is now at Zeitenlick, where 
 the service is very hard ; but it is interesting and 
 she is at an age to enjoy novel experiences, even 
 when they have to be paid for with mighty hard 
 work. 
 
 224
 
 XXIX 
 
 July 22, 1918 
 
 This has been such a week of mixed emotions 
 that I have not been able to settle down to write. 
 
 I got your cable of congratulations on the 
 "great victory" last night. I shall say what 
 I think of that later. It may surprise you to 
 know that I am not in the humour. We are 
 calm and confident here. We are not throwing 
 our hats in the air yet. The tension has been 
 terrible, and it is a comfort to know that to-night 
 there is not a German on the south bank of 
 the Marne, and we hope they have crossed it 
 for the last time. 
 
 I wrote you, if I remember, the night before 
 the Fourteenth, when I was preparing to go up 
 to town to help celebrate the great day. 1 
 went and I enjoyed it. 
 
 It was drizzly weather, and when, at nine, 
 I prepared to go out and find a place so near 
 the Porte Dauphine that I could see the Allied 
 armies enter the city from the Bois, 1 found 
 that no one wanted to go with me, on the plea 
 that it would be prettier to see it with my eyes 
 than go out in a crowd plus a drizzle, which 
 of course was flattering but covered a lazy spirit. 
 
 Luckily it stopped raining, and the air was 
 Q 225
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 fresh, the sky a little overcast, and there was 
 no dust. It was an ideal day for comfort. 
 
 I stay in Paris only five minutes' walk from 
 the entrance to the Bois at the end of the Avenue 
 du Bois. I ne ver saw the city look more beau- 
 tiful. Nothing had been done to conceal or dis- 
 figure its beauty. There were no seats put up 
 along the route, and the only tribune was on 
 the east side of the Avenue — near the Porte — 
 just an enclosed space hung in the traditional 
 red, with reserved seats for the President, the 
 diplomatic corps and the city's guests. 
 
 On the same side of the Avenue, a little 
 nearer the Porte, was the colour-stand. All along 
 the street on both sides were the chairs that are 
 always there, only more of them, and a simple 
 wooden barrier behind them prevented people 
 from pushing into the space thus reserved. 
 There was no bunting on any of the houses 
 — nothing in the way of decoration, but the 
 flags of all the Allied nations. 
 
 Every inch of space was taken. When I 
 arrived at my place, just behind the colour-stand, 
 the presidential party had already arrived, and 
 I passed behind a long line of the most wonderful 
 automobiles I ever saw (and did not much 
 wonder at hearing some one remark, "Well, 
 it seems there is still some essence in Paris ! "). 
 
 Just then the head of the procession began 
 to issue from the trees of the Bois, and approach 
 the Porte. The light was just right for it, and 
 the forest of moving bayonets made a wonderful 
 picture, which I shall never forget. Most of 
 
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 the people in the great crowd had evidently, 
 like me, never seen many of the armies, though 
 most of them had, like me, I suppose, seen 
 individual soldiers of all the Allies. I am sure 
 the American papers have given you a full de- 
 scription of the great cortege in which the armies 
 of all the Allies-in-arms for the world's liberty 
 marched for the first time in the city the whole 
 world loves, and which even her enemies envy, 
 and doubtless, by the time you get this, the 
 cinemas will have shown it moving on the screen, 
 for I counted almost as many machines at work 
 as there were nations in the show. But what 
 they cannot give you is the colour, which was 
 atmospherically French, and how much that says, 
 you who love France know, nor can it give 
 you the thrills. I simply adored seeing the 
 flag of each nation approach, and the colours 
 on the Allied stand dip to receive each nation's 
 salute, and the soldiers in the crowd as far as 
 I could see rising to attention with their hands 
 at salute as the flags passed. 
 
 Along the barrier, behind the seats, soldiers, 
 mostly American, British and Italian, who were 
 not marching, stood erect braced like bareback 
 riders in their perilous position, and they managed 
 to stand rigid as statues to salute the colours — a 
 fine athletic display. 
 
 The handsomest men in the line were, to 
 my mind, the Italians. Their greenish-grey 
 uniform is a beautiful colour, and their hats, 
 higher in form than those of the other Allies, 
 are terribly smart. But the sturdy Serbs and 
 
 227
 
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 the Poles with their new flag, and the Czechs, 
 who sang as they marched, were greeted with 
 thundering cheers. As the Americans were the 
 clou of the Fourth of July, the British carried 
 off the honours of the Fourteenth. They made 
 a wonderful showing, so trim, marching as if 
 they had never done anything but parade duty, 
 they who have fought like the bulldogs they are. 
 There were English and Irish, Scotch and Welsh, 
 there were Australians, New Zealanders, the 
 armies of Egypt and India and South Africa. 
 It was a fine show, and none of them were 
 more cheered than the tall ruddy men in kilts 
 marching to the crooning of the pipes. It was 
 so hard to realize that this was a demonstration 
 in the midst of a war, at a time when the enemy 
 was nearer the fortifications of the city than 
 they had been in forty-six months, in a city 
 which had known forty days of bombardment 
 by a German cannon, and could not be sure 
 that the forty-first might not come before the 
 procession disbanded. 
 
 It was this spirit that I had gone out to see and 
 I had seen it. 
 
 This was the sort of experience one cannot hope 
 to get more than once in a fortunate lifetime, the 
 sort of thing that centuries have not seen, and 
 centuries may never see again. It was the very 
 essence of the spirit which is to carry a righteous 
 cause to victory, and which future ages will have 
 good reason to bless. 
 
 As a detachment of French cavalry brought up 
 the rear — for the French divisions had been scat- 
 
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 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 tered through the line, acting as escort to their 
 comrades-in-arms, which I thought a pretty idea — 
 the crowd broke up quietly, and, while the echoes 
 of the cheers came back to me, receding with the 
 music as the cortege continued its route, I walked 
 slowly back to the house, strangely comforted. 
 
 We all knew that we were on the eve of another 
 German offensive, and with the consciousness of 
 the great bound forward of two of the previous 
 ones, it was impossible to be quite free from 
 nervousness, or from the feeling that Paris was 
 in danger. But we had seen the men who were 
 to meet the attack, and seen nowhere anything 
 but courage, so why should we worry ? 
 
 Personally, I can say that nothing has done me 
 so much good as the two look-ins 1 have taken in 
 Paris in the past ten days, with the men who are 
 defending her marching through her streets. 
 
 On that day, no more than on the Fourth, did 
 any of the things the pessimists prophesied come 
 true. The grosse Bertha did not get to work. 
 The night was quiet — no air raid. 
 
 I stayed over until the morning of the 1 6th. 
 I had to. I had a few necessary errands to do. I 
 arrived in Paris on Saturday after many shops — 
 now having what they called u la semaine anglaise'' 
 — were closed, and Monday, the day after the 
 Fourteenth, was a holiday. 
 
 On Monday — the 15th — just before two 
 o'clock, " bang " went the big Bertha again, after a 
 silence of three weeks. The first shot went harm- 
 lessly into the Seine, just missing a great mark, 
 and after a lapse of about three hours it began 
 
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 again and put in several shells before dark. No 
 one had any doubt that this presaged the new 
 offensive, and we impatiently awaited the papers 
 the next morning, which announced simply the 
 fact that the Germans had attacked again on the 
 front from Soissons, which they still hold, to 
 Reims, which, although they have destroyed it, 
 they have not been able to take since they were 
 driven out in the battle of the Marne — that is to 
 say, the nearest point to us. 
 
 Needless to tell you that I could not get back 
 home quickly enough, although the little news we 
 got seemed to be good. The Allies were holding 
 them. This time the Germans had not been able 
 to take Foch's army by surprise, as they had done 
 in March and May. The attack, in extent, vigour 
 and material, seemed to be quite as formidable as 
 that of March for Amiens. 
 
 Amelie met me at the station, and almost before 
 I was out of the train she told me that the 
 Americans had gone. The rest of the division, 
 as I had foreseen, never came at all, and a camion 
 came for those stranded on our hill, and carried 
 them away. 
 
 She announced that the movement on our roads 
 had been terrible for over forty-eight hours. The 
 little road passing my gate had seen three hun- 
 dred camions dashing by towards the canal on the 
 day before — the day the battle began. No sleep 
 had been possible for two nights. She had had 
 great difficulty in getting to the station, as the 
 route nationale was closed to all civilians. She had 
 come down by the cart-track acrossthe fields. 
 
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 I lost some time at the station — my baggage 
 had not come. It was not personal baggage — that 
 is still waiting in Paris, to go to Versailles, if 1 
 have to. It was only a sack of sugar — oh, so 
 precious ! — and a case of condensed milk from an 
 American rescue work, for the little refugee chil- 
 dren and the old people. I had checked it the day 
 before to save time. The station is always so 
 crowded at train-time, and one has to wait so inter- 
 minably to be weighed that I took advantage of 
 the holiday, when I had nothing to do, to get it 
 off". Incidentally, I am distressed about it, as it 
 has not turned up yet, and that is six days ago. 
 But on the day I returned I was too occupied 
 with other anxieties to worry. Besides, it would 
 have been a heavy load for Ninette to drag up 
 the hill. 
 
 When we turned out from the station and 
 crossed the Morin, the road looked clear, and 
 after the guard had examined my papers — they 
 seem to put a new guard every day, so it always 
 has to be done — Amelie foolishly decided to 
 try going up the grande route. We had not gone 
 ten steps when a soldier with a red flag appeared 
 in front of us, and turned us back, and we had to 
 come up the ruelle. It is a very steep, very rough 
 path, deeply rutted by farm-wagons and mowing- 
 machines. The day was very hot. Ninette 
 struggled along until I finally decided that, even 
 in the blazing sun, I could climb on foot easier 
 than I could sit behind her, and watch her strain 
 and tug, so Amelie and I both got out and walked 
 up, and I took in the news at the various stations 
 
 231
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 we made to rest. The Americans had come to 
 say good-bye. They had said a lot of things, and 
 she was sad because she had not understood a 
 word. Meaux had been bombarded Monday and 
 rather seriously damaged. Otherwise everything 
 was as usual. 
 
 During the next two days the news was not bad, 
 and then on Saturday came word that Foch had 
 launched his counter-attack, and that it looked 
 brilliantly successful. By Sunday morning we 
 knew that the Germans had recrossed the Marne 
 at Dormans, just south-east of Chateau-Thierry, 
 hotly pursued by the Americans — not a live 
 German, unless he was prisoner, left on the south 
 bank of the river. Every day since then the 
 Germans have retreated. It is slow, but it is 
 hopeful. 
 
 Ever since we have lived again on the map. 
 Although we do not yet feel like calling it "a 
 glorious victory " as you do, we do feel that 
 never again will the Germans cross the Marne. If 
 the Allies have been able to thrust them back now, 
 when the Americans are not yet all ready, how 
 can it be possible that we shall not hold them 
 when we are getting stronger every day ? We 
 may be wrong, for one thing we do know, the 
 Germans are still strong, and they will fight a 
 terrible battle. They have still thirty unused 
 divisions, and ever so much more artillery than 
 we have, and a spy system that is amazing. They 
 advanced from the Chemin des Dames in May to 
 the Marne, thirty miles in six days. It has taken 
 us nearly a week to push them back, mile by mile, 
 
 232
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 a third of the way, so our relief is great, but our 
 joy is cautious and well-contained. 
 
 I was speaking of the slowness of the retreat 
 and the economy of it, so far as the Germans 
 were concerned, this morning, to an officer, and 
 he replied : 
 
 " It is better than we dared hope. If, before 
 winter sets in, we can succeed in pushing them 
 back to the strong positions in which they started 
 in March, we shall feel more than satisfied, and 
 hopeful, as by the spring the States will be really 
 ready, and we shall be as strong as they are — at 
 least — in artillery, and surely stronger in the air, 
 and then we'll finish them off, but it will still take 
 time. They are mighty strong, and it is death we 
 propose to deal out to them." 
 
 I imagine that this is a pretty fair statement of 
 the situation. It makes me shiver sometimes to 
 see how immediately hopeful you are. I have 
 been that way myself, and I know what getting 
 over it means. 
 
 Of course, a thousand things may happen — the 
 morale may break in Germany. But those who 
 know both the people and the country say it never 
 will. So my present prayer is that the interim 
 may be useful for the spreading of the conviction 
 that this war must not stop when Germany is ready 
 to make concessions, not even when she is ready 
 to evacuate the lands she has seized, not even when 
 she begins to whimper and regret — not until she 
 is beaten to her knees, and not even then until she 
 has been punished, and punished so severely that 
 she cannot recover quickly, and left with a mark 
 
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 on her which she cannot conceal, not even by her 
 most clever camouflage. She is a criminal nation. 
 At large she is a danger to every nation and to 
 every people on the face of the earth. 
 
 Now don't, I entreat you, reply that you have 
 heard me preach prison reform. I have. I don't, 
 of course, believe in treating even criminals like 
 wild beasts — yet I don't know. At least I do 
 believe in a restraint which protects the community. 
 I never did, nor could, advocate pardon and liberty 
 for jail-birds of marked criminal tendencies. The 
 stigmata of crime are very persistent, and Germany 
 bears the mark. Why should one cherish illusions 
 for a race which one dares not harbour for the 
 individual ? 
 
 In an age which proudly calls itself civilized — 
 whatever that may mean — Germany has waged a 
 war such as even barbarous times never knew. It 
 has not been a war of legitimate slaughter, which 
 would have been terrible enough in a world of to- 
 day's aspirations and pretension. It has been a war 
 of violating women, abusing children, murdering 
 inoffensive civilians, a war of rapine and wilful 
 destruction, of breaking every law of the God whom 
 they arrogantly claim, of every law man has made for 
 the safeguarding of the community, a war of lies 
 and cunning, by a people who claim the whole 
 world, and deliberately deny the right of even 
 existence to every one not born German, who 
 arrogate to themselves the right to sin, and deny 
 the right to live to all other races. 
 
 We are told that before the offensive of March 
 21 was launched the disciplinary laws which 
 
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 have long governed armies were all suspended 
 by order of the German Commander-in-chief, 
 and that the sack of all France on the hoped-for 
 line of march from St. Quentin to the sea, and 
 from the Chemin des Dames to Paris, was 
 promised the German soldiers as their reward for 
 victory, and what really happened seems to bear 
 out the truth of the abominable statement. From 
 St. Quentin to the Somme, and from the Chemin 
 des Dames to the Marne, as well as the time per- 
 mitted, they accomplished the object. The 
 amount of booty they carried off was tremendous, 
 and if everything did not fall as loot to the army, 
 they at least achieved a destruction as complete as 
 possible. 
 
 Naturally I did not see this with my own eyes, 
 but I have it on the testimony of soldiers who have 
 come back from the devastated country, and whose 
 word I have no reason to doubt. They tore to 
 bits tapestries which they had not time to destroy. 
 They smashed mirrors. They made firewood of 
 the furniture in the humbler houses which was 
 not good enough to send to Germany. They 
 smashed dishes. If they did not destroy crops 
 which they could not carry off, or if they left a 
 pin anywhere it was only because in neither of 
 their great pushes did they achieve their objective, 
 and in both they met a resistance more tenacious 
 than they expected, and which cost them dear, so 
 that in certain places they were unable to accomplish 
 under bombardment a destruction as thorough as 
 they planned or had the will to do. 
 
 It is on things like this on which our minds 
 
 235
 
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 fasten — for the flesh is weak and shrinks from 
 such suffering as all that entails on the individual. 
 Yet that is not Germany's worst crime. She has 
 attacked the fundamental virtues towards which 
 the world has been marching for centuries, and 
 for which it has fought and bled many times — the 
 rights of peoples to choose their own fates ; the 
 rights of the individual to freedom ; the hopes 
 that free peoples have cherished of seeing the 
 world become honest, and she has tried to bend 
 all the world to the slavery of force. In that lies 
 her greatest crime, and it is for that abominable 
 crime that she has to suffer, and must suffer, 
 unless the world is to be thrown back a thousand 
 years. 
 
 After all it is ideas that make history, not facts. 
 From the beginning Man has shed his blood for 
 ideas and opinions. They make history. That 
 has marked the passing of people, of habits and 
 customs, but the ideas have persisted. From the 
 beginning — or rather in the short span of which 
 we know anything — man has always had to fight 
 and bleed for his^ideas. Perhaps he always will. 
 Who knows ? Considering how little the majority 
 understand this it is wonderful how heroically 
 they do it. 
 
 As an example of that : the other day I met a 
 young American officer — a lieutenant from the 
 South — and in course of the conversation he 
 remarked that France could " never recover her- 
 self," and when I smiled and shook my head at 
 him, he added with a great deal of feeling : 
 
 " But you have not been out there. You have 
 
 236
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 no idea of the destruction. There is not one 
 stone on another. It is terrible. When this war 
 is over, and all the costs counted, you will see that 
 France is finished." 
 
 I had the folly to remark that all that would 
 soon arrange itself, and that I counted as unim- 
 portant in the great scheme the material destruction, 
 and was only concerned in the spiritual side of it 
 all. Of course he did not understand. Why 
 should he ? So I thought it not worth while to 
 state that personally I had a deep regret for every 
 stone thrown down and a deeper sorrow for every 
 young life so bravely given. He looked at me as 
 if I was crazy. I suppose he thought me a white- 
 haired old crank. Is it not true of all of us who 
 read our history straight — or as straight as our 
 limited intelligences will let us — that, though the 
 life of each generation is made enthralling by the 
 personal struggle, by new ways of making money, 
 new ways of spending it, new ways of living and 
 new ways of dressing and eating and amusing 
 ourselves, these are not the vital things. If they 
 were, there would have been few wars, in spite of 
 adventurers, camp-followers and free-lances. 
 
 It is no palliation of the offence that the war the 
 Germans forced on the world, with a criminal 
 intent, has made of the fighting nations of the 
 defence a people who will be all the finer for the 
 struggle. It does not lighten Germany's sin that 
 the world will have a nobler future, and living 
 itself be the more worth while, for the serried 
 effort the Allies have made. It is nothing to 
 Germany's credit that, in the shoulder-to-shoulder 
 
 2 37
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 and heart-to-heart sacrifices, and the heroically 
 borne great grief, old differences have been for- 
 gotten and a better understanding achieved, that 
 out of her sin good will come. She has done 
 her most devilish to prevent that. The nations 
 fighting out there in front of us to-day — on that 
 long line from the Swiss frontier to the North Sea, 
 and with stiff lips and brave eyes offering their 
 best beloved on the altars of right, justice and 
 liberty — must not be merciful except to a repentant 
 sinner. That Germany will never be. It is not 
 possible to her Kultur. A whining, lying, hypo- 
 critical — in fact a camoufle — penitent she may be ; 
 more than that is and will be for generations 
 impossible for a nation and people bred to believe 
 that what a people has strength to do, it has the 
 right to do. If after all the experience the Allies 
 have had they can be tricked into extending pity 
 to a beaten Germany, why then they have fought 
 and bled in vain. I suppose there are good 
 Germans. Well, God must pity them, but they 
 must, for the time, suffer for the crimes of their 
 race as innocent children suffer for the sins of their 
 fathers, and for the same reason ; so why should 
 man be foolishly lenient when neither the Almighty 
 nor nature is ? 
 
 We thought Belgium's tragedy could not be 
 capped until Serbia's capped it, and I am inclined 
 to believe that Germany's deliberate debauching 
 of Russia and her conscious mutilation of the soul 
 of a people is her worst crime, for it may have 
 arrested for centuries the slow and hoped-for 
 evolution of a nation and a race in which we all 
 
 238
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 may have had too much faith, but which, now that 
 chaos has been dealt out to it, may be long in 
 recovering, because one sees nowhere in sight yet 
 the national hero who might wave a magic wand 
 of personal love and magnetic patriotism and still 
 the waters the Huns have troubled. The Allies 
 have a duty — to aid in conjuring that spirit, but it 
 can never be done while there is a German foot on 
 Russian soil. 
 
 You ask in one of your late letters if I 
 
 have been reading Cheradame on the " Eastern 
 
 Question." Of course I have. His arraignment 
 
 of facts is appalling. I own that. But it seems 
 
 rather a pity that, while his statistics have tended 
 
 to terrorize an easily terrorized people, some one 
 
 does not add a footnote to remind the world, not 
 
 only that there is a spirit in this great war — it has 
 
 a soul as well as facts — and that if the Allies have 
 
 seemed to neglect the eastern to devote themselves 
 
 to the western frontier it must not be forgotten 
 
 that, with all the forces they have, they have barely 
 
 been able to hold the Huns at bay there. Besides, 
 
 the vital thing is to defeat Germany, and it is 
 
 immaterial where that is done so that it is done, 
 
 and it is far from done yet. When Germany is 
 
 well licked, and only then, will it be possible to 
 
 deal with the races concerned in what has for so 
 
 long been known as the Eastern Question, which 
 
 really dates back to the seventeenth century, when 
 
 Austria started on her " eastern route," if it does 
 
 not go far back of that to the fall of Constantinople 
 
 and the entrance of the Turk into Europe. With 
 
 this great massacre ended, with Germany weakened 
 
 239
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 and punished, and the Turks driven out, the 
 Eastern Question can be dealt with by other means 
 than a sword ; and I dare say it will be found 
 that, delivered from Prussian intrigue, the vic- 
 torious Allies, with the power and the will to do 
 it, will meet with aid and not opposition from the 
 people concerned. But just as long as Germany 
 is left with power to interfere such dreams can 
 never be realized. Imagine the mentality of a 
 people who can be lulled to sleep with Kaiser 
 Bill's " Peace Talk," who can even tolerate a 
 leader who states that the Allies are responsible for 
 the continuation of the war because they refuse to 
 stop fighting to protect their homes and liberties 
 by acknowledging themselves beaten, pay the 
 expenses of a war forced on them, and leave in the 
 hands of the spoiler his loot in lands, subject 
 peoples, and material ! 
 
 After all the Kaiser made a mistake when he 
 thought he was a second Napoleon I. Do you 
 know what he is like ? He is a reincarnation of 
 Nabuchodonosor. Do read Chapters V and VI of 
 the Book of Judith in the Apocrypha if you don't 
 believe me. And the King of the Assyrians had 
 his Hindenburg, only even in those days of 
 barbarity it did not occur to Holofernes to poison 
 the wells and sources he seized when he set out to 
 reduce Jerusalem. 
 
 I suppose you will reply that this comes very 
 ill from me, who have been saying that I was tired 
 of talk, and only wanted acts — words after achieve- 
 ments. Only a fool never changes her mind. I 
 can't be really a fool, I change mine so often. 
 
 240 

 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 I note also that you object to my saying "dirty 
 Germans " so often. That is only because I am 
 becoming so very American — it's an ill war that 
 brings about no good — ahem ! That's all right. 
 You may laugh. Besides, I supposed that you had 
 heard the song the Amex boys brought over with 
 them — a song which lists off what a soldier may 
 expect each day in the week — shrapnel one day, 
 then gas, then " over the top," down to the hospital 
 on Saturday, and a funeral on Sunday, and each 
 day's prayer is " Oh, you dirty Germans, I wish 
 the same on you." Ever since I heard it in Paris 
 we have never spoken of the Huns except as " dirty 
 Germans," and even Amelie can say it, and prefers 
 it to u les sales Boches " — the usual French 
 designation, and of which " dirty Germans " is 
 a literal translation. 
 
 Speaking of songs, I am told that the Marines 
 went " over the top " at Chateau-Thierry singing, 
 " I want to go home, I am too young to die," and 
 with cigarettes in their mouths. I don't vouch for 
 that now, but it was told me by one of them, a 
 sergeant who led the third wave over — thirty men. 
 There were only two left with him when the 
 mitrailleuse they encountered was silenced. But I 
 can believe it. You ought to hear what the French 
 say of the Amex boys, especially of how they fight 
 when an assault becomes a hand-to-hand. They 
 say that even when their ammunition is out, and 
 their guns shot out of their hands, they use feet 
 as well as fists, and rush it, heads down, as if in a 
 football tussle. They assert that with experience 
 they are going to make great soldiers. That 
 R 241
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 emphasizes the blow at the German military ideas, 
 doesn't it ? 
 
 I imagine that they have already dealt out a 
 flush of surprises to the Germans. We have seen 
 a large number of the prisoners here whom the 
 Americans took — some of them not looking more 
 than fifteen or sixteen years old. A few of them 
 know a word or two of French, and when ques- 
 tioned about the Americans they said : " Mediants 
 les Americains — mediants ! ' Aren't they wonder- 
 ful ? Strange people who feel the right to do the 
 things they have done, and then think a soldier 
 who fights back impolitely is " mechant" 
 
 While I am writing this Amelie and Pere have 
 gone to look at the big gang of prisoners who 
 have built our new double bridge, which crosses 
 both the canal and the Marne at Mareuil, and the 
 new road which will connect the route nationale 
 with that to Compiegne, well west of Meaux. I 
 haven't seen it since it was begun, but they have 
 been down several times and tell me it is very 
 handsome. 
 
 242
 
 XXX 
 
 Remembrance Day, 191 8 
 
 Well, we are entering on the fifth year of the 
 war. We were pained in 19 14 when Kitchener 
 prophesied a three years' war, and very cross when 
 an American financier declared that it might last 
 seven. I rather imagine five will settle it, bat I 
 am not prophesying. It is a long road still to the 
 frontier. But to-day, when all the world, except 
 Central Europe, is joining England in her solemn 
 service of prayer, and the Allied chiefs are ex- 
 changing cables of hope and confidence, I may as 
 well do my bit, by sending you my message. I 
 feel especially inspired to do it by the fact that 
 your letter just received expresses some surprise 
 at what you call my losing my nerve, in the first 
 week in June. Did I ? Do you know, I can't 
 remember. But you must know that the situation 
 here was desperate from March 21 up to Foch's 
 counter-offensive on July 18. When I say 
 desperate I mean just that. 
 
 Speaking of that time, I never told you that my 
 famous sack of sugar never got here. By one of 
 those errors that happen often, but by good luck 
 never happened to me before, the cases I sent out 
 from Paris on the morning of the 15th — the day 
 
 2 43
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 the fifth offensive was launched — did not get 
 put off at Esbly, where our narrow-gauge line 
 meets the main line, but went on to the end, which, 
 as the Germans were across the Marne at that 
 time at Dormans, was La Ferte-sous-Jouarre, the 
 next station beyond Meaux, and only about eleven 
 miles from here. That night the railway station 
 was bombarded by the Germans and destroyed 
 and the stationmaster killed. So my precious 
 sugar was burned up. I mention the fact only as 
 interesting, and because it may account for what 
 you call my nervousness. I am perfectly sura 
 that if ever I were condemned to die for a cause, 
 the hours of waiting for the end would be — shall 
 we say ? — trying. 
 
 But all that is changed, and one forgets easily. 
 
 On Friday night, at eight o'clock, the Allies 
 entered Soissons again, and the pillar of the Ger- 
 man position for the march on Paris by the 
 valley of the Oise is lost to them. With both the 
 valley of the Marne and that of the Oise closed to 
 the invader, Paris is again safe, and we are again 
 calm, and draw a long breath of relief, even 
 though we know that we must count it lucky if, 
 before winter, we can see the Huns back on the 
 famous Siegfried line, from which they bounded 
 last March, and to which they retreated in March 
 of 19 17. There they will be in almost impreg- 
 nable positions, behind a long line of veritable 
 fortresses, and in much better winter quarters 
 than the Allies. 
 
 One of the prettiest things about this slow 
 push forward, which is a victory, slow as it is, 
 
 244 
 

 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 is the fact that every nation in arms for the Allied 
 cause has taken part in it, and distinguished itself. 
 
 Our boys, fresh and untried, have more than 
 held their own. I had a letter yesterday from a 
 Californian who is with the Foreign Legion, who 
 writes : " Since I saw you we have been through 
 two campaigns with our beloved division. The 
 first gave us all the sensations of the agony of 
 retreat, the second all the exhilaration of a victory. 
 And more than that, we have had the thrill of 
 seeing our American troops fight side by side 
 with the hardened legionnaires and make goody 
 
 One more consoling thing. I have often asked 
 myself, since 1 saw another war winter looming in 
 sight, how our boys were going to stand the 
 rough billets to which the poilus are accustomed 
 — so different from the camp quarters of their 
 months of training at home, in England and even 
 here. An American officer, who was here yester- 
 day, tells me that, although the fighting regiments 
 between the Marne and Fisme, which the boys 
 from the States retook by assault, are cantonned 
 in an absolutely destroyed country, under the 
 roughest conditions, they take it gaily — he has 
 never heard the very smallest complaining. 
 
 So here we are at the beginning of the Year V. 
 
 We know that Germany is still strong. We 
 cannot close our eyes to the knowledge that her 
 death-struggle will be full of fearfulness. Still, 
 with the days shortening — I had to light up last 
 night at half-past seven in the salon, the first time 
 I have had a light except in my bedroom since the 
 last of May, which means winter will be here 
 
 245
 
 THE PEAK OF THE LOAD 
 
 before we know it — we are really gayer than at 
 the opening of any winter since the war began. 
 It is not wholly because we are hardened to it. It 
 is because the dawn of the new era begins to glow 
 on the horizon of the future. We are moving 
 slowly towards new days, for the world that was 
 has gone, and the special colour of the days before 
 the war can never be again. My Remembrance 
 Day prayer is that the spirit moving over the 
 fighting-line to-day and flinging its wide wings 
 over the heads and hearts of all of us behind the 
 lines may persist and make the nations as fine in 
 the great after-the-war work ahead of them, as 
 they have been noble, sacrificing, loyal to one 
 another, and patriotic to their own flags in the 
 great fight. 
 
 THE END
 
 SOME REGENT BOOKS 
 
 RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL REEFER 
 By James Morris Morgan. 
 
 "A consistently readable and racy account of many years 
 stuffed with vivid adventure and quaint experience." — Spectator. 
 
 SCENES OF RUSSIAN LIFE 
 By Josephine Calina. 
 
 " In Miss Calina's writing - , with its unaffected beauty ot natural 
 description, its intense human sympathy, and its strangely 
 suffering yet courageous accent, we recognize something of the 
 quality of the great Russian novelists." — Westminster Gazelle. 
 
 RHYME AND REVOLUTION IN GERMANY 
 
 A Study in German History, Life, Literature and 
 Character, 1813-1850. 
 By J. G. Legge. 
 
 "Those who want to know what Germany two generations ago 
 was like will in fact find here a true and lively picture." — Times. 
 
 GERMANISM FROM WITHIN 
 
 New Edition with a New Preface. 
 By A. D. McLaren. 
 
 "A study of Germany and German policy by an exceptionally 
 able observer." — Daily Mail. 
 
 ON THE EDGE OF THE WAR ZONE 
 
 From the Battle of the Marne to the Entrance of 
 the Stars and Stripes. 
 By Mildred Aldrich. 
 
 "So delightfully is the book written that we seem to be living 
 in the same house with her, among the same dauntless French 
 peasantry, anxiously awaiting from hour to hour the moment 
 which would bring either tragedy indescribable or victory beyond 
 all measure." — Truth. 
 
 AMERICA'S DAY 
 
 By Ignatius Phayre. 
 
 "'America's Day' is unique as a war book, comprising a 
 record of the present times, with instructive sidelights from 
 past history and including an entertaining and complete narra- 
 tive of one of the most thrilling and momentous periods of the 
 Great War." — Pall Mall Gazette. 
 
 CONSTABLE & CO, Ltd., 10 Orange Street, LONDON, W.C. 2
 
 NEW FICTION 
 
 STRANGE ROADS 
 By Maud Diver. 
 
 Author of "Captain Desmond, V. C," etc. 
 WHAT NOT 
 
 A Prophetic Comedy. By Rose Macaulay. 
 
 Author of " Non-Combatants," etc. 
 
 THE STARRY POOL and Other Tales 
 By Stephen G. Tallents. 
 
 THE POT BOILS 
 
 By Storm Jameson. 
 
 OH ! MONEY, MONEY ! 
 
 By Eleanor H. Porter. 
 
 Author of "Just David," " Pollyanna," etc. 
 
 GUDRID THE FAIR 
 
 By Maurice Hewlett. 
 
 Author of "The Forest Lovers," etc. 
 
 ANNE'S HOUSE OF DREAMS 
 By L. M. Montgomery. 
 
 Author of "Anne of Green Gables," etc. 
 IMPOSSIBLE PEOPLE 
 
 By Mrs. George Wemyss. 
 
 Author of " The Professional Aunt," etc. 
 
 THE ANCHOR 
 
 By M. T. H. Sadler. 
 
 Author of " Hyssop." 
 
 THE REPUBLIC OF THE SOUTHERN CROSS and 
 Other Stories 
 
 Translated from the Russian of Valery Brussof. 
 
 THE SHIP OF DEATH 
 
 By Edward Stilgebauer. 
 
 Author of " Love's Inferno." 
 
 THE MAKING OF AN ENGLISHMAN 
 By W. L. George. 
 
 New Edition with a New Preface. 
 
 CONSTABLE & CO., Ltd., 10 Orange Street, LONDON, W.C 2
 
 o 
 
 SI O r f 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 Santa Barbara 
 
 THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE 
 STAMPED BELOW. 
 
 Series 9482
 
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