There were trees again; windmills with their great wings turning peacefully; walled gardens and wayside shrines; holly climbing over privet hedges; and rows of pollard willows, their early buds a reddish brown; and tall Lombardy poplars, yellow-green with spring. The road stretched straight ahead, a silver line. Nothing could have been more peaceful, more unwar-like. Peasants trudged along with heavy milk cans hanging from wooden neck yokes, chickens flew squawking from the onslaught of the car. There were sheep here and there. "It is forbidden to take or kill a sheep--except in self-defence!" said the officer. And then suddenly we turned into a small town and came on hundreds of French omnibuses, requisitioned from all parts of France and painted a dingy grey. Out of the town again. The road rose now to Cassel, with its three windmills in a row on the top of a hill. We drove under an arch of trees, their trunks covered with moss. On each side of the highway peasants were ploughing in the mud--old peasants, bent to the plough, or very young boys, who eyed us without curiosity. Still south. But now there were motor ambulances and an occasional long line of motor lorries. At one place in a village we came on a great three-ton lorry, driven and manned by English Tommies. They knew no French and were completely lost in a foreign land. But they were beautifully calm. They sat on the driving seat and smoked pipes and derided each other, as in turn they struggled to make their difficulty known. "Bailleul," said the Tommies over and over, but they pronounced it "Berlue," and the villagers only laughed. The officer in the car explained. "'Berlue,'" he said, "is--what do you Americans say--dotty? They are telling the villagers they want to go crazy!" So he got out and explained. Also he found out their road for them and sent them off, rather sheepish, but laughing. "I never get over the surprises of this war," said the officer when he returned. "Think of those boys, with not a word of French, taking that lorry from the coast to the English lines! They'll get there too. They always do." As we left the flat land toward the coast the country grew more and more beautiful. It rolled gently and there were many trees. The white houses with their low thatched roofs, which ended in a bordering of red tiles, looked prosperous. But there were soldiers again. We were approaching the war zone. CHAPTER XVI THE MAN OF YPRES The sun was high when we reached the little town where General Foch, Commander of the Armies of the North, had his headquarters. It was not difficult to find the building. The French flag furled at the doorway, a gendarme at one side of the door and a sentry at the other, denoted the headquarters of the staff. But General Foch was not there at the moment. He had gone to church.