It runs serious dangers before it reaches its destination. At Herbècourt the trench stops some yards in front of the entrance to the village. It is raining shells. The shells rage particularly on the road which runs through the village, the only one along which supplies can go. There is no longer a well-marked road. The well taken care of highway no longer exists; it is full of holes and is but one yawning crevasse more than three hundred yards long. The wagons and trucks have made a chance path in the neighboring fields. They wait at the entrance of the village, some yards from the point where the barrage persists, for a lull. When it comes, they rush like a whirlwind with a mad burst of speed, and it is a miracle that they are not crushed. All one hears are oaths, cries, blows; wagons lock together, horses fall and get up at once; all this in the twinkling of an eye. Thirty wagons pass between two shells. We, too, make a dash and reach the other end without much risk. The danger is greater from the autos which rush by us like meteors, graze us, and threaten a hundred times to cut us to pieces or to catch our clothes and drag us under the wheels. But the greatest danger is from the tottering walls, and the waving roofs which the rolling of the wagons brings falling down. We reach the cemetery at the beginning of the country. It is still nearly intact. Graves are turned up; tombstones are thrown down on their sides. Its walls are holed with loopholes, which served the last defenders of the village. But the grass is not even tramped down in the corners. “Can’t we stay here five minutes to get our breath?” “If you want to.... We deserve it.” A battery of “75’s” held the position a few minutes ago. It has just abandoned it to get nearer the lines. The place is deserted; it is like a visit in the country at two steps from the fiery furnace. We stretch out on a mound of turf between two tombs. It is the hour of twilight; the sky is golden; the sun on the horizon plunges into the marshes of the Somme. A fresh breeze blows through the privet hedge. “A summer evening in the country!” “Within the country would be more in accord with the circumstances, I think.” As if to make my punning more emphatic, four “77’s” burst at the same time and smash the cemetery walls to bits. “_Foutre!_” This expression, peculiar to Marseilles, has a significant meaning on Morin’s lips. “You have said it; the place is no longer safe.” “The battery changed its position because it had just been spotted. We are taking its place and are a target for the Boche artillery.” We make our way forward as fast as we can. The bombardment of the abandoned position behind us continues in volleys of four shells at a time. The cemetery we just left is nothing but a ruin, a chaos from which black smoke rises. We keep on running, each holding an end of the wreath which impedes us terribly. Although it is light, it seems heavy.