day they were in touch with the
French.

The preceding night the three received places in wagons and slept
heavily. By morning their strength was fully restored and pending the
arrival of the Strangers, with whom they intended to remain they served
as aides.

Several days passed, but not in idleness. Incessant skirmishing went on
in front, and the Uhlans were nearly always in sight. John felt the
presence of vast numbers. He surmised that the British army did not
number more than a hundred thousand men, but multitudes of French were
on their right and still greater multitudes of Germans were in front. It
was a wonderful favor of fortune or skill that the British had not been
cut off and as the German hosts, fierce and determined, poured forward,
there was no certainty that it would not yet happen.

John soon became at home among the English, Scotch and Irish. He found
many of his own countrymen in their ranks and he continually heard his
own language in more or less varied form.

The thrilling nature of the tremendous spectacle soon made him forget to
some extent the awfulness of war. Riding with his comrades at night
along the front he saw again the flashing of the German searchlights,
and now and then came the mighty boom of the great guns.

Belgian refugees told them that the advance of the Germans was like the
rolling in of the sea. Their gray hosts poured forward on every road.
They would be going through a village, for hours and hours, for a day, a
night and then the next day, an endless gray tide, every man perfectly
equipped, every man in his place, hot food always ready for them at the
appointed time, cavalry in vast masses, and cannon past counting.

The knowledge lay upon John like a weight, tremendous and appalling, and
yet he would not have been elsewhere. He was glad to be on the battle
front when the fate of half a billion people was being decided.

Many of the spectacular features afforded by earlier battles
disappeared, but others took their place. In the clear air they
sometimes saw the flashes of the giant cannon, miles away, and flying
machines and captive balloons sprinkled the air. An army could no longer
hide itself. Forests and hollows were of no avail. The scouts of the
blue, looking down saw every move, and they brought word that the menace
was growing heavier every hour.

"We'll fight on the morrow," said John as he stood with Carstairs and
Wharton before a camp fire. "I feel that the