hips commandeered from the P. &
O. line and bearing distinctive stripes around their hulls. One
hospital ship is set apart for the wounded Indians, and the apartments
within are fitted up according to the various religious castes
prevalent among the troops of India now fighting in France and
Flanders. Here at times puts in Lord Zetland's yacht, fitted out by
Queen Alexandra for wounded English officers.

When you travel by rail, if you did not know that war was in the
country you would never suspect it, unless you wondered why a
red-hatted, blue-coated guard, with a rifle carelessly swung over his
shoulder, is noticeable now and then by a cross-road or near the
buttress of an important railroad bridge. You pass trains of troops,
but the uniforms are quiet, the men jovial and unwarlike. The wounded
are not conspicuously moved by day.

Although you are not many miles away from the firing line, where an
average of more than ten thousand are daily falling, the country is as
peaceful and quiet as can be imagined. The big black and white horses
are winter ploughing. The red and black cattle and the sheep and hogs
are grazing in fields and pastures. The reddening willows speak of an
early spring, and the full blue streams tell the brown grasses, and the
tall poplars that their colors will soon be gayer.

As the shadows fall, no guard comes as in England to pull your curtain
down according to military orders; and, as you approach Paris, you see
families dining by uncurtained windows in blazing light. You are
astonished after your London experience of semi-darkness to find the
boulevards ablaze and no apparent fear of aerial enemies or
sky-invasion, although aeroplanes and Zeppelins and bombs may be flying
and fighting only eighty miles away. Now and then a searchlight
illumines the heavens, but even searchlights are far less conspicuous
than in London. In January the lights were ordered to be lowered; but
Paris will not stand for long London fog, gloom, or darkness. The
French atmosphere and life demand light.

Paris is gradually getting accustomed to the situation. More than 30
first-class hotels are partially opened and advertising. Many of the
business streets have a semi-Sunday appearance. Boulevards running
from the Place de l'Opera are well filled with people, and nearly all
of the stores are now open. In the first weeks of December you could
see the reopening day by day, and when on the 10th the govern