The engineers in this part of France publish a monthly magazine called _The Spiker_. They love to get hold of these newspapers notices and to publish them with comments. From a San Francisco paper they gleaned that “Willie ----, the cotillion leader of last season’s younger set, leaves for France shortly with the Blankth Engineers to take charge, it is understood, of the construction of a telephone system contemplated by the government to facilitate the hauling of troops to the front.” The comment records that the erstwhile cotillion leader, Private ----, is now on the business end of a No. 2 shovel. Well, what of it? The shovel work has to be done just as the prairie sod had to be turned. The men growl about it sometimes, but mostly they grin. They chalk “P. G.” on the backs of their jumpers, the same letters appearing in white on the vivid green uniforms of the German captives at work in many camps. They mean _Prisonnier de Guerre_, war prisoner, and when the weather is cold and rainy and letters from home are delayed, and spirits sink, you can hardly blame the men from feeling at times a little like prisoners. They had expected excitement and perhaps some glory, and hard work and isolation is their lot. But what they are doing, tedious enough day by day, is in the aggregate splendid and invaluable to the success of our army. The like of it was never done before by any army in the world. When the Germans see it, as they will some day through their newspapers, they will be aghast at the hugeness of it. They had sneered at the idea of the Americans sending a large army to France. How could they send an army? An army can’t swim, nor can it fly, and the Americans had no ships. Even if they found ships and sent men enough, how could they feed, clothe and equip them? How could they keep up their supplies? The Americans could and did perform all these miracles because they had in them the blood of pioneers, of men and women whom no difficulties could afright, no obstacles turn back. Our soldiers have proved themselves in countless army camps abroad to be worthy sons of the breed. I remember one big aviation camp which was built in a few months out of short lengths of boards because the colonel and his staff couldn’t get any better lumber. They were told that they couldn’t buy any lumber at all, that there was none available in that part of France. But they did get it, and they built the camp. The men lived in tents during the coldest weeks of winter with icy winds blowing over the barren plain. All aviation camps are built on big plains. In spite of the cold the men had no stoves furnished them. No doubt stoves were contemplated, but they did not reach the camp. But you can’t freeze pioneers. Those boys just went to work and built stoves, built them out of mud, brick and stones, oil cans and biscuit tins and any other old junk they could find lying around. They made stovepipes out of condensed milk cans, and they kept warm.