ller wood, a few
lorries drawn up and silent, and, beyond, two or three buildings of wood
set down by themselves, with a garden in front, and a notice "Officers'
Quarters." Here, then, Captain Harold stopped the car, and they got out.
There were some jovial introductions, and presently the whole party set
off across the cleared space to where, in the distance, one could see
the edge of the forest.

Peter did not want to talk, and dropped a little behind. Harold and the
O.C. of the forestry were on in front, and Mackay, with a junior local
officer, were skirmishing about on the right, taking pot-shots with small
chunks of wood at the stumps of trees and behaving rather like two
school-boys.

The air was all heavy with resinous scent, and the carpet beneath soft
with moss and leaves and fragrant slips of pine. Here and there, on a
definite plan, a small tree had been spared, and when he joined the men
ahead, Peter learned how careful were the French in all this apparently
wholesale felling. In the forest, as they saw as they reached it, the
lines were numbered and lettered and in some distant office every
woodland group was known with its place and age. There are few foresters
like the French, and it was cheering to think that this great levelling
would, in a score of years, do more good than harm.

Slowly biting into the untouched regiments of trees were the men, helped
in their work by a small power engine. The great trunks were lopped and
roughly squared here, and then dragged by motor traction to a slide,
which they now went to view. It was a fascinating sight. The forest ended
abruptly on a high hill, and below, at their feet, wound the river. Far
down, working on a wharf that had been constructed of piles driven into
the mud, was a Belgian detachment with German prisoners, and near the
wharf rough sheds housed the cutting plant. Where they stood was the
head of a big slide, with back-up sides, and the forest giants, brought
to the top from the place where they were felled, were levered over, to
swish down in a cloud of dust to the waiting men beneath.

"Well, skipper, what about the firewood?" asked Harold as they stood
gazing.

"How much do you want?" asked the O.C. Forestry.

"Oh, well, what can you let me have? You've got stacks of odd stuff
about; surely you can spare a bit."

"It's clean agin regulations, but could you send for it?"

"Rather! There's an A.S.C. camp below us, and the men there promised