Or as a woman put it more logically, "What else can we do? Remember, _we_ knew the Boche in '70 when _you_ did not. We know what he has done in the last year. This is not war. It is against wild beasts that we fight. There is no arrangement possible with wild beasts." This is the one vital point which we in England _must_ realize. We are dealing with animals who have scientifically and philosophically removed themselves inconceivably outside civilization. When you have heard a few--only a few--tales of their doings, you begin to understand a little. When you have seen Rheims, you understand a little more. When you have looked long enough at the faces of the women, you are inclined to think that the women will have a large say in the final judgment. They have earned it a thousand times. III BATTLE SPECTACLE AND A REVIEW Travelling with two chauffeurs is not the luxury it looks; since there is only one of you and there is always another of those iron men to relieve the wheel. Nor can I decide whether an ex-professor of the German tongue, or an ex-roadracer who has lived six years abroad, or a Marechal des Logis, or a Brigadier makes the most thrusting driver through three-mile stretches of military traffic repeated at half-hour intervals. Sometimes it was motor-ambulances strung all along a level; or supply; or those eternal big guns coming round corners with trees chained on their long backs to puzzle aeroplanes, and their leafy, big-shell limbers snorting behind them. In the rare breathing-spaces men with rollers and road metal attacked the road. In peace the roads of France, thanks to the motor, were none too good. In war they stand the incessant traffic far better than they did with the tourist. My impression --after some seven hundred miles printed off on me at between 60 and 70 kilometres--was of uniform excellence. Nor did I come upon any smashes or breakdowns in that distance, and they were certainly trying them hard. Nor, which is the greater marvel, did _we_ kill anybody; though we did miracles down the streets to avoid babes, kittens, and chickens. The land is used to every detail of war, and to its grime and horror and make-shifts, but also to war's unbounded courtesy, kindness, and long-suffering, and the gaiety that comes, thank God, to balance overwhelming material loss. FARM LIFE AMIDST WAR