ls of
her native Lorraine, to make a pilgrimage to her shrine, became our
supreme ambition.

I could indeed have visited Domremy before, but purposely had I waited
for this date. On December thirteenth, President Wilson, coming to the
Peace Conference, was to land in France. I wanted to say Mass, that
very morning, at the shrine of the Maid for the welfare of the
President.

A one hundred and fifty mile trip from Thiacourt to Domremy, south of
Verdun on the Meuse, especially in an open motorcycle car and through a
blinding storm of hail and rain, is not particularly pleasant.

When we recalled, however, the arduous journey she, a girl, of eighteen
years, had once made on horseback from Domremy to Chinon, three hundred
miles, through snow-covered roads, we determined that nothing short of a
Firing Squad should stop us.

A cold I had contracted at Rembercourt had settled in my back. Lumbago
had painfully doubled me into an inverted "L," a figure not happily
adapted to a cycle car.

Laboriously adjusting myself to the machine I plainly told the Maid, "I
wish you clearly to appreciate, Saintly Joan, that I am making this
journey for you. Of old, you were supremely helpful to the ruler of
_your_ country. I want you to do as much for the President of _mine_. I
am going to say Mass on your home altar for him, and I want you to help
me. If God spares me, and I return to America, I promise to proclaim
your glory and encourage all I can, young and old, in the practice of
your devotion."

Early dawn found us on our way. The steel helmet pulled low offers
splendid protection to one's eyes. Traversing the old battlefields of
St. Michel, we passed ruined Even and Essey and took the highroad
leading south. The shell-torn steeple of Flirey church still leaned over
the road; and the grewsome Limey Gondrecourt front, its deserted dugouts
resembling grinning skulls, elicited a sigh and a prayer for its dead
legions.

Through Noviant and Men-le-Tour we sped, and at noon were beyond Toul
and racing through the historic valley of the Moselle.

At Bullney, our speeding car was curiously observed by thousands of
German prisoners peering through the barbed wire enclosure of their
roadside camp.

Columbes-les-Belles, with its huge hangars, grimly stood in silhouette
against a crimson burst of sunset.

At Neufchateau we reached the river Meuse with whose glory the names of
heroic inconquerable Petain and Verdun shall be forever shar