of the Post, the Telegraph and
Telephone bristle with women, of course, for eleven thousand have taken
the places of men. Some seven thousand fill up the empty positions on
the railways, serving even as conductors on through trains. Their number
has swollen to a half million in munitions, and to over half that number
in powder mills and marine workshops; in civil establishments over three
hundred thousand render service; and even the conservative banking world
welcomes the help of some three thousand women.

[Illustration: Has there ever been anything impossible to French women
since the time of Jeanne d'Arc? The fields must be harrowed--they have
no horses.]

Out on the land the tally is greatest of all. Every woman from the
village bends over the bosom of France, urging fertility. The government
called them in the first hours of the conflict. Viviani spoke
the word:--

"The departure for the army of all those who can carry arms, leaves the
work in the fields undone; the harvest is not yet gathered in; the
vintage season is near. In the name of the entire nation united behind
it, I make an appeal to your courage, and to that of your children,
whose age alone and not their valour, keeps them from the war.

"I ask you to keep on the work in the fields, to finish gathering in the
year's harvest, to prepare that of the coming year. You cannot render
your country a greater service.

"It is not for you, but for her, that I appeal to your hearts.

"You must safeguard your own living, the feeding of the urban
populations and especially the feeding of those who are defending the
frontier, as well as the independence of the country, civilization
and justice.

"Up, then, French women, young children, daughters and sons of the
country! Replace on the field of work those who are on the field of
battle. Strive to show them to-morrow the cultivated soil, the harvests
all gathered in, the fields sown.

"In hours of stress like the present, there is no ignoble work.
Everything that helps the country is great. Up! Act! To work! To-morrow
there will be glory for everyone.

"Long live the Republic! Long live France!"

Women instantly responded to the proclamation. Only the old men were
left to help, only decrepit horses, rejected by the military
requisition. More than once I journeyed far into the country, but I
never saw an able-bodied man. What a gap to be filled!--but the French
peasant woman filled it. She harvested that