the
advantage. Instead of a beautiful town there remains a heap of cinders,
with here and there a wrecked facade of pitiful grace or broken dignity
to tell where stood the proudest buildings.

The sky was empty of enemy 'planes; but our guide hurried us through the
town, where the new road shone white in contrast with our cars; and
having hidden the autos under a group of trees outside, led us on foot
toward the convent. The approach was exquisite: a long, long avenue of
architectural elms, arbour-like in shade, once the favourite evening
promenade of Chauny. That tunnel of emerald and gold would have been an
interlude of peace between two tragedies--tragedy of the town, tragedy
of the convent--if the ground hadn't been strewn with torn papers, like
leaves scattered by the wind: official records flung out of strong boxes
by ruthless German hands, poor remnants no longer of value, and saved
from destruction only by the kindly trees, friends of happy memories.
"The Boches didn't take time to spoil this avenue," said our officer.
"They liked it while they lived in the convent; and they left in a
hurry."

Just beyond the avenue lies the convent garden; and though it is autumn,
when we stepped into that garden we stepped into an oasis of
old-fashioned, fragrant flowers, guarded by delicate trees, gentle as
the vanished Sisters and their flock of young girl pupils; sweet, small
trees, bending low as if to shield the garden's breast from harm.

I wish when Chauny is rebuilt this convent might be left as a _monument
historique_, for, ringed by its perfumed pleasance, it is a glimpse of
"fairylands forlorn."

One half believes there must have been some fairy charm at work which
kept the fire-breathing German dragon from laying this garden waste when
he was forced out of his stolen lair in the convent! Little remains of
the house, and in the rubbish heap of fallen walls and beams and
plaster, narrow iron bedsteads, where nuns slept or young girls dreamed,
perch timidly among stones and blackened bricks. But in the garden all
is flowery peace: and the chapel, though ruined, is a strange vision of
beauty framed in horror.

Not that the Germans were merciful there. They burned and blew up all
that would burn or blow up. The roof fell, and heaped the floor with
wreckage; but out of that wreckage, as out of a troubled sea, rise two
figures: St. Joseph, and an almost life-size, painted statue of the
Virgin. There the two stand fi