On returning, found Mrs. S. and Miss E. arrived from the village of the fifteenth-century towers,[12] and the khaki-clad sons of Mars from over the seas, their hearts filled with patriotism and their tank with American _essence_. Coffee under the chestnut-tree, lovely sun filtering through, and the little white butterflies flying about the little white ash-tree; and we told stories, being all of us souls that laugh, which we did, till we couldn’t breathe, at the story of the woman’s-preparedness meeting in a certain transcendental town where the head of the assembly in solemn accents besought as many as felt drawn to such work to become automobilists—“and the moment the Germans set foot in New York rush the virgins to the West, preferably Kansas City.” In the town of brotherly love, where a like assemblage was held, an immediate position was available, March, 1917, with a commission of major-general, to look after dead soldiers’ widows for another blinking female. _Oh! là, là!_—and when one thinks we’ve _got_ to win the war! _Later._ Have just laid down _Le Mannequin d’Osier_, completely dazzled by that first chapter, so monstrously clever, so diabolically lucid, so icily logical, so magnetically cynical, and I said to myself, after all, “one can only write of war in between wars.” I long for a friend to read with me the pages where M. Roux, on short leave during his years’ military service, says to M. Bergeret, “_Il y a quatre mois que je n’ai pas entendu une parole intelligente_,” to the paragraph where M. Bergeret says, “_Mais nous sommes un peuple de héros et nous croyons toujours que nous sommes trahis_.” It stimulated a desire for the discussion of things as they are, over against what one idiotically hopes they may be, with a bit of imagination concerning the future thrown in. _July 29th, evening._ In the afternoon we all went to another theatrical representation in the big hall, given by the _1er Régiment de Marche des Zouaves_. Again immense concourse. Again the “Marseillaise,” and again the _Lion d’Orient_ made his majestic entry, and dozens of generals and high officials followed him, and again all sat forming their glittering hemicycle in front of the stage. Again a few nurses, some wives of officers, and the thousands of _poilus_. A great poster read: “_Vous êtes priés d’assister au convoi, service, et enterrement du Père Cafard, assassiné par le Communiqué._ “_Le deuil sera conduit par le Pinard, le Jus, la Gniole, le Tabac, et tous les membres du Chacal hurlant._”