We carry the wounded from the château to the trains. Some trips are about seventeen kilometers one way, and others are more. As the roads are well used, they are rather bumpy, so you have to go very slowly. You do not dash at full speed with your wounded! It is slow work, for, in addition to the necessity for making the trip as easy as possible for the _blessés_, you have to dodge in and out among the transports, which usually fill up the roads. There is a steady stream going and coming, horses, mules, and auto-trucks. You never saw so many of either one of the above. Thousands of each kind. You well know the dust on the roads. We have to drive ahead regardless of the clouds of dust, so you can imagine what sights we are when we get back to our farmhouse. Scarecrows, each one. The dust is powdery and comes off easily, however, so you can get comfortable in a short time. There is no lagging or loafing; you blow your whistle and the driver of what's ahead of you gives you six inches of road and you squeeze through and take a chance that the nigh mule on the team coming the other way doesn't kick. [Illustration: AT A DRESSING-STATION NEAR VERDUN] The _blessés_ are a quiet lot, especially after you give them cigarettes. I always pass around the cigarettes before starting, for then I'm sure those _en derrière_ will be quiet. Every now and then you have a "hummingbird," that is, a _blessé_ who is so hurt that the least jar pains him and he moans or yells. You can't help him any, so you just have to put up with it. However, I don't like "hummingbirds," for you feel that you hit more bumps. I went to a show down in town where some of the soldiers are _en repos_. It was wonderful, for there, right within range of the _Boche_ guns, the soldiers were giving one of the best musical shows I have ever seen. Among the actors--men who only a little while before were in the trenches--were professional musicians, singers, and actors. It was not amateurish--in fact, it was highly professional. The theatre was fitted up more or less like the stage at the Hasty Pudding Club at Harvard (an amateurish back, however), but everything else savored of the real Parisian touch. Among the audience were generals, colonels, under-officers, _poilus_, and five of us (we were invited, inasmuch as we had lent some of our uniforms for the actors). The soldiers who could not get in thronged the courtyard and cheered after every song or orchestra piece. The orchestra was made up of everything in a city orchestra, including a leader with a baton. You see each regiment is bound to have professional men in it and they get up the shows. (I saw my cap walk out on the stage on a fellow with a little head, so it didn't even rest on his ears, but rather on his nose). On the whole, it was one of the greatest and most impressive sights I've seen, and on top of it all, there was a continuous firing in the near distance. Imagine it, if you can!