We went along smoothly until we began meeting a great number of trucks, gun-carriages, and soldiers. This made me think that we must be near the actual fighting, and I was crazy to stop for a minute and listen for the guns, but I did not dare to. Then we met a very nice-looking chasseur on a bicycle, who held on to the side of the car and gave us all the information we wanted. First place, he told us that we were off the regular road for Chauny, and that we were almost at Pierrefond de Soucy, which town was four kilometres from the actual front! This thrilled us, as you may imagine. Then we were held up by a guard, who talked at great length with the first car, and after finally letting them go on, stopped us and said that we could not go for five minutes, that we must keep out of sight of the first car, never stop under any conditions until we passed the next sentinel, and that he had no business to let us go on this road at all, as the Germans could see us on an ordinary day, but it being foggy he would let us by! For the first time I really felt as if there were some danger. As a matter of fact, it was practically nil, for the Germans are very methodical in their way of fighting, and do not fire on certain roads except at certain times. However, our chasseur friend told us that the woods we could see beyond the field on the right were French, but that the Germans were on the hill beyond. That made them seem pretty near. We just scurried through that town and the next. The road was very carefully screened on one side, with burlap and trees and wire covered with grass. There were some guns ready for action at the corners of the roads, and many signs saying that autos should not use this road except after dark. The woods were full of soldiers, who waved and shouted at us. I found that they all saluted our car, as they took it for granted that we must have an officer with us like the front car, so I began saluting back, and it seemed to please them terribly. By the end of the last day, I got so that I could give a very military salute without any trouble, which I consider quite a feat, for the driving was hard,--the speed and the bad roads combined with the very constant and real danger of the officers' cars which we met, and which, of course, would simply run through you if you did not give way.