destruction have on the mighty course of the struggle? . . . Thus it is
that war seems vague and casual, because a mere fragment of it
defeats the imagination, and the bits of even the fragment cannot
be fitted together. Why, I have stood in the first-line trench itself and
heard a fusillade all round me, and yet have seen nothing and
understood nothing of the action!

It is the same with the movements of troops. For example, I slept in
a town behind the front, IN and I was wakened up--not, as often, by
an aeroplane--but by a tremendous shaking and throbbing of the
hotel. This went on for a long time, from just after dawn till about six
o'clock, when it stopped, only to recommence after a few minutes. I
got up, and found that, in addition to the hotel, the whole town was
shaking and throbbing. A regiment was passing through it in auto-
buses. Each auto-bus held about thirty men, and the vehicles rattled
after one another at a distance of at most thirty yards. The auto-
buses were painted the colour of battleships, and were absolutely
uniform except that some had permanent and some only temporary
roofs, and some had mica windows and some only holes in the
sides. All carried the same number of soldiers, and in all the rifles
were stacked in precisely the same fashion. When one auto-bus
stopped, all stopped, and the soldiers waved and smiled to girls at
windows and in the street. The entire town had begun its day. No
matter how early you arise in these towns, the town has always
begun its day.

The soldiers in their pale-blue uniforms were young, lively, high-
spirited, and very dusty; their moustaches, hair, and ears were
noticeably coated with dust. Evidently they had been travelling for
hours. The auto-buses kept appearing out of the sun-shot dust-