Return to the Place du Chapitre; many officers and motors under the yellowing trees in front of the _Kommandantur_, a general arriving, some sort of delegation departing. I say a thousand thanks to the amiable, cultivated, agreeable Demoiselles Braun, three of whom wear decorations for their war-work in hospitals, for contagious diseases, and one, Stéphanie, “_qui n’a pas dit son dernier mot_,” is charming after the way of the perceptive, witty women of the seventeenth or eighteenth century. Then I find myself getting into the motor of the commandant, who, in the meantime, has greeted and sped the general on his way. His face has something shining about it as he gives the great news, written on the no longer insubstantial air, of the German demand for an armistice. Then he reads the _communiqué_ from the Belfort newspaper as we drive out of Masevaux, telling us more about the Germans in full retreat, and the Americans close behind them at _Sedan_! What a rustling of the pages of history! The mind leaps to new things, life normal again, and all forces bent to reconstruction. As we pass over the screened road to Thann, where we are to lunch with the military mayor, Captain Saint-Girons, the net of broom and pine camouflage, screening the valley where the Germans are, suddenly seemed some monument of ancient history; and, unlike the noisy hours of yesterday, there was no sound of cannon. Arrived at Thann, it is we who give the great, the unbelievable, the unrealizable news of the demand for an armistice to Captain Saint-Girons, who, with several uniformed schoolmasters, is waiting in front of the Mairie to receive us. And our “feet are beautiful as the feet of them that bring the Gospel of Peace and glad tidings of good things.” I think for a moment how strange for _me_ to carry it to them, to these men, who have fought for it, who have waited for it, watched for it, bled for it—but everything is strange in this strangest of all strange worlds. Going into the house, we find other schoolmasters, with some bright-eyed little boys ranging in years from seven to twelve. Then to lunch. I sit on the commandant’s right, Captain Gasquet, _adjoint_ of the mayor, on my other side, the mayor himself opposite, the schoolmasters placed prudently and watchfully near that selected flock, who enliven the ends of the table. Now these little Alsatian hopefuls are very bright of eye, rosy of cheek, and on their good behavior, which, in spite of lurking potentialities, persisted during the lunch, even when a glow, doubtless not unaccustomed, tinged their cheeks, as they drank the wine of their own hillsides.