left
home for my first trip to Europe. I found it where I hoped, and
shutting one edge of it into the drawer, I let the stripes hang downward
and pinned the following inscription into its folds:

"I swear that the contents of this desk are purely personal and can be
of value to no one but myself. I therefore leave it under the
protection of my country's flag."

I felt very proud when I had done this and then hurried into my
dressing-room where I hastily filled my suit-case with a few warm
underclothes, a change of costume, and an extra pair of shoes. I had
about finished and was heartily glad that this useless job was over,
when on glancing out of the window I caught sight of fuzzy-haired Madame
La Miche driving up the avenue in her dog cart.

Madame La Miche and her husband run a big stock farm near Neuilly St.
Front, some fifteen miles from Villiers. I had often seen her at
poultry and agricultural shows, where their farm products usually
carried off any number of prizes. It was she who sold me my cows hardly
a year since.

"You?" I said, as she drew up to the steps.

"Yes. En route--like all the others. Our entire fortune is in live
stock and I'm going to try to save as much as I can. May we come in?"

Certainly--and a half-hour later one of the largest farms in France had
been moved bodily into my pasture land! The whole thing was conducted
in a very orderly manner by M. La Miche, who on horseback drew up the
rear of this immense cavalcade composed of some two hundred white oxen,
hitched two abreast, seventy or eighty horses, as many mares with young
colts, and heaven knows how many cows and calves; all accompanied by the
stable bands. Poor tired beasts, how greedily they drank the cool water
of our spring, and how willingly the cunning little colts, whose tender
hoofs had been worn to the quick by their unheard-of journey, allowed
the men to tie up their feet in coarse linen bandages with strips of old
carpet for protection.

Madame La Miche had been officially evacuated at noon, so I did not
hesitate to tell her what I had heard. She was not surprised, and said
she intended leaving at midnight, but her animals, unaccustomed to such
exercise, must have a few hours' rest.

In the kitchen I found George and Leon, who had accomplished their task
sooner than I expected. Relying on their word that it was impossible to
tell where they had buried the trunks, I did not go back to the sand
quarry. Ha