We were presented at the door with some copies of a charming, really literary newspaper, _L’Horizon, Journal des poilus_, and there was a little paragraph, “_Hiérarchie française qu’on trouve au Théâtre des Armées_,” which also described the protocol of seating, “In the first row near the stage wounded men are lying, immediately behind them wounded men are sitting, then come ladies, if there are any—and then come officers!” General Goïgoux and General Abbevillers sat near us. While waiting we looked at _L’Horizon_ and laughed with General Goïgoux over a paragraph showing the philosophy of a son of Mars under certain circumstances, and it was the following: Nature is kind. She places the remedy near the ill and often cures, as one has seen, evil by evil. A woman, too much loved, sent me a letter so cruel that I didn’t even have the strength to tear it up, but carried it around in my pocket for weeks. One night, being quartered in a stable, I took my coat off and hung it up. The next day, no letter. A cow had eaten it. Nature is kind. When General Gouraud, first in command, entered, the “Marseillaise” sounded, a thrill went through the vast assemblage, and we all arose. _Le Lion d’Orient_ is tall, intensely straight, his whole thin, khaki-clad body on parallel lines with his perpendicular armless right sleeve. Long, straight, brown hair _en brosse_, bronzed skin. His entry was a thing not to be forgotten. I wondered “Is it the East that stamps great chiefs with such majesty, that can give them such calm?” and I thought of Gallipoli—blue seas, battles, wounds, hospital ships. Then the curtain rose on one of the most delightful theatrical representations I have ever seen, screamingly funny, and quite chaste. But all that _entrain_, all that life, to be snuffed out to-morrow or the next day, or the next? At Craonne or Reims or Verdun or wherever it may be? And how natural that they should sing of love and women, and say witty things concerning food and raiment and the government, till the end! After the performance, during which nobody had ever been so hot before, the sun moving across the hall and grilling each row in turn, we passed out in a great jam of _poilus_. One huge man, with the thickest of meridional accents and red cheeks, and eyes like two black lanterns, and a coal-black beard, was gesticulating at a small, hook-nosed, blond man. “_Le Midi, le Midi—qu’est-ce que tu en sais, toi, bêta? Les Anglais t’ont déjà pris ton trou de Calais, aussi je te demande, sale type_, what army corps took the _plateau de Craonne_” and he burst into a great laugh of triumph. Then, borne on the blue waves, we found ourselves in the open air and realized what we had been breathing.