Once I saw two armies in the selfsame street, one dirty and bedraggled and with thinned ranks, the other fresh and with the light of eager quest in its eyes. One was marching south while the other was marching north. One was from Yorkshire in old England and the other was from America. Ah, it was a sight to turn stone into tears when the tall, sinewy lads from the western hemisphere halted just where the avenue faces the Madeleine, and cheered those weary heroes marching back from hell.
Paris is far behind me as I write, but the soldiers who shouted their admiration for the wounds of a thousand convalescent "Tommies" bound for "Blighty" are with me. God only knows how many of those far-called heroes will be marching down that glorious way of Paris when the battalion musters out for home. They are now where civilization has reared her altars, where democracy has found her Gethsemane. But this we all know: they will "carry on."
Chapter III
DOWN IN FLAMES
"The Boche is coming back," a man yelled into the entrance of the cellar. A second later I was above ground and with my head at the sky-scraper angle. There he was! Like a great homing pigeon he was streaking it for his own lines after an observation-flight far behind ours. He was high, but not high enough to hide the telltale crosses on the under side of his wings, and the churn of his engine was unmistakable.
When my eyes brought him into focus, he was at least a mile away, but in half a minute he was directly overhead. The guns were roaring all about; shrapnel bursts surrounded the pirate bird. Ah! that one broke near! For just an instant he faltered, but on he came.
I stepped into the doorway of an old shattered stone house to find cover from the falling shrapnel and stray pieces of shell. The Boche was flying as the eagle flies when his objective has anchored his eye; he turned neither to the right nor to the left. He quickly and constantly changed his elevation, however; but the batteries were doing splendidly, and that he escaped destruction is a miracle. Two minutes more, and he was out of hearing and virtually safe.
There was a chorus of disgust; strong words in lurid splashes filled the air. Particularly fluent were the men when they passed comment upon the French fliers.
"Where are they?" they inquired in derision.