An Historic Gathering--In which King and President, Joffre and Haig Take Part--His Majesty and the Little French Girl--I Am Permitted to Film the King and His Distinguished Guests--A Visit to the King of the Belgians--A Cross-Channel Journey--And Home 214 CHAPTER XXI THE HUSH! HUSH!--A WEIRD AND FEARFUL CREATURE Something in the Wind--An Urgent Message to Report at Headquarters--And What Came Of It--I Hear for the First Time of the "Hush! Hush!"--And Try to Discover What It Is--A Wonderful Night Scene--Dawn Breaks and Reveals a Marvellous Monster--What Is It? 222 CHAPTER XXII THE JUGGERNAUT CAR OF BATTLE A Weird-looking Object Makes Its First Appearance Upon the Battlefield--And Surprises Us Almost as Much as It Surprised Fritz--A Death-dealing Monster that Did the Most Marvellous Things--And Left the Ground Strewn with Corpses--Realism of the Tank Pictures 230 CHAPTER XXIII WHERE THE VILLAGE OF GUILLEMONT WAS An Awful Specimen of War Devastation--Preparing for an Advance--Giving the Bosche "Jumps"--Breakfast Under Fire--My Camera Fails Me Just Before the Opening of the Attack--But I Manage to Set it Right and Get Some Fine Pictures--Our Guns "Talk!" Like the Crack of a Thousand Thunders--A Wonderful Doctor 234 CHAPTER XXIV FIGHTING IN A SEA OF MUD Inspecting a Tank that was _Hors de Combat_--All that was Left of Mouquet Farm--A German Underground Fortress--A Trip in the Bowels of the Earth--A Weird and Wonderful Experience 245 CHAPTER XXV THE EVE OF GREAT EVENTS A Choppy Cross-Channel Trip--I Indulge in a Reverie--And Try to Peer Into the Future--At Headquarters Again--Trying to Cross the River Somme on an Improvised Raft--In Peronne After the German Evacuation--A Specimen of Hunnish "Kultur" 250 CHAPTER XXVI AN UNCANNY ADVENTURE Exploring the Unknown--A Silence That Could be Felt--In the Village of Villers-Carbonel--A Cat and Its Kittens in an Odd Retreat--Brooks' Penchant for "Souvenirs"--The First Troops to Cross the Somme 259 CHAPTER XXVII THE GERMANS IN RETREAT The Enemy Destroy Everything as They Go--Clearing Away the Débris of the Battlefield--And Repairing the Damage Done by the Huns--An Enormous Mine Crater--A Reception by French Peasants--"Les Anglais! Les Anglais!"--Stuck on the Road to Bovincourt 266 CHAPTER XXVIII THE STORY OF AN "ARMOURED CAR" ABOUT WHICH I COULD A TALE UNFOLD