wall there was a yet larger map, made
of aeroplane photographs taken at a uniform altitude and so pieced
together that the whole was a complete picture of our sector of
front. We spent hours over this one. Every trench, every shell hole,
every splintered tree or fragment of farmhouse wall stood out clearly.
We could identify machine-gun posts and battery positions. We could
see at a glance the result of months of fighting; how terribly men had
suffered under a rain of high explosives at this point, how lightly
they had escaped at another; and so we could follow, with a certain
degree of accuracy, what must have been the infantry actions at
various parts of the line.

The history of these trench campaigns will have a forbidding interest
to the student of the future; for, as he reads of the battles on the
Aisne, the Somme, of Verdun and Flanders, he will have spread out
before him photographs of the battlefields themselves, just as they
were at different phases of the struggle. With a series of these
pictorial records, men will be able to find the trenches from which
their fathers or grandfathers scrambled with their regiments to the
attack, the wire entanglements which held up the advance at one point,
the shell holes where they lay under machine-gun fire. And often they
will see the men themselves as they advanced through the barrage fire,
the sun glinting on their helmets. It will be a fascinating study, in
a ghastly way; and while such records exist, the outward meanings, at
least, of modern warfare will not be forgotten.

* * * * *

Tiffin, the messroom steward, was standing by my cot with a lighted
candle in his hand. The furrows in his kindly old face were outlined
in shadow. His bald head gleamed like the bottom of a yellow bowl. He
said, "Beau temps, monsieur," put the candle on my table, and went
out, closing the door softly. I looked at the window square, which was
covered with oiled cloth for want of glass. It was a black patch
showing not a glimmer of light.

The other pilots were gathering in the messroom, where a fire was
going. Some one started the phonograph. Fritz Kreisler was playing the
"Chansons sans Paroles." This was followed by a song, "Oh, movin' man,
don't take ma baby grand." It was a strange combination, and to hear
them, at that hour of the morning, before going out for a first sortie
over the lines, gave me a "mixed-up" feeling, which it was impossible
to a