luxuriance of the plain! The French have got Ablain St. Nazaire. We
may go to Ablain St. Nazaire ourselves if we will accept the risks of
shelling. Soldiers were seriously wounded there on that very day, for
we saw them being carried therefrom on stretchers towards the
motor-ambulance and the hospital.

After more walking of a very circuitous nature, I noticed a few bricks
in the monotonous expanse of dwarf earth-mounds made by shells.

"Hello!" I said. "Was there a cottage here?"

No! What I had discovered was the illustrious chapel of Notre Dame
de Lorette.

Then we were in a German trench which the French had taken and
transformed into one of their own trenches by turning its face. It had
a more massive air than the average French trench, and its
cellarage, if I may use this civilian word, was deeper than that of any
French trench. The officers said that often a German trench was
taken before the men resting in those profound sleeping-holes could
get to the surface, and that therefore they only emerged in order to
be killed or captured.

After more heavy trudging we came to trenches abandoned by the
Germans and not employed by the French, as the front had moved
far beyond them. The sides were dilapidated. Old shirts, bits of
uniform, ends of straps, damaged field-glass cases, broken rifles,
useless grenades lay all about. Here and there was a puddle of
greenish water. Millions of flies, many of a sinister bright burnished
green, were busily swarming. The forlornness of these trenches was