ound it a
strange unusual thing. Not a sign of any human being could I see as I
gazed over the great battlefields of France. There was no glint of
helmets, no flash of guns, no movements of regiments, no stirring of
the earth. There was a long tract of country in which no living thing
moved: utterly desolate in its abandonment. Yet beneath the earth
here, close to us as well as far away, men crouched in holes waiting
to kill or to be killed, and all along the ridges, concealed in dug-outs or
behind the low-lying crests, great guns were firing so that their
thunder rolled across the ravines, and their smoke-clouds rested for a
little while above the batteries.

The general was pointing out a spot on Hill 196 where the Germans
still held a ridge. I could not see it very clearly, or at least the
general thought my eyes were wandering too much to the right.

"I will drop a shell there," he said, and then turned to a telephone
operator who was crouched in a hole in the wall, and gave an order to
him.

The man touched his instrument and spoke in the mouthpiece.

"C'est la batterie?"

There was a little crackling in the telephone, like twigs under a pot,
and it seemed as though a tiny voice were speaking from a great
distance.

"Now!" said the general, pointing towards the crest.

I stared intently, and a second later, after a solitary thunderstroke
from a heavy gun, I saw a shell burst and leave a soft white cloud at
the very spot indicated by the old man at my side. I wondered if a few
Germans had been killed to prove the point for my satisfaction. What
did it matter--a few more deaths to indicate a mark on the map? It
was just like sweeping a few crumbs off the table in an argument on
strategy.

In another hole to which the general took me was the officers' mess--
about as large as a suburban bathroom. At the end of the dining-table
the captain was shaving himself, and laughed with embarrassment at
our entry. But he gave me two fingers of a soapy hand and said
"Enchante" with fine courtesy.

Outside, at the top of the tunnel, was another group of officers, who
seemed to me cheery men in spite of all the hardships of their winter
in a subterranean world. The spring had warmed their spirits, and
they laughed under the blue sky. But one of them, who stood chatting
with me, had a sudden thrill in his voice as he said, "How is Paris?"
He spoke the word again and said, "Paris!" as though it held all his
soul.

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