A gentleman-farmer of the neighbourhood was put into prison under the pretence that he talked German too much! Another was arrested all of a sudden without any apparent reason. "But why am I arrested?" "Go on, you will know later." The poor wretch came back from Germany a year afterwards, ill, worn out, done for. Only they had neglected to reveal to him why he had been imprisoned. It is not difficult to imagine how these prisoners were hunted. A man was arrested in Barenton. A gun had been found in his bed, it would seem. He was confined for a time at Laon, managed to escape, and went right to Morny, where M. Dunard, his lifelong friend, hid him in his house. Did any one betray the runaway's retreat? I do not know, but two days after his arrival an under-officer and four men came to M. Dunard's, one from the street, the others from the garden, turned the farmer, his wife, and the maid out of doors, conscientiously searched the house, found the fugitive, and took him away. We saw the poor man pass between two gendarmes on horseback. He looked desperate; his hands, tied to one of the stirrups, were quite blue. But immanent justice, dear to the Germans, had a watchful eye. Here it was even imminent. A good citizen of Morny was just coming back from the forest, with his donkey put to a cart, loaded with wood. The ass saw a procession, which he thought unseemly, and proclaimed his opinion in the way usual to his kind. The horses, frightened by the loud hee-haw, reared and fell back. A military motor-car which was approaching could not stop in time, and gave a sudden lurch, followed by a general confusion. Horses, gendarmes, donkey, cart, and logs fell topsy-turvy to the ground. Oh, the poor prisoner with his tied-up hands! Well, he alone came off safe and sound. He alone, and the donkey of course. Gendarmes, horses, and driver got up lame to the right and left, and more or less injured. After some bandaging the Germans took their prisoner away all the same, but the interlude had given a few minutes of intense joy to many people. For a long time we were afraid that the men of the village would be all taken away. We knew that in many northern places the male population had been carried off to fill up German prisons. When would they do the same in Morny? "When the Germans withdraw," was the general answer. And the expectation of this day filled us with a mixture of joy and dread. The day came, and the Germans did not withdraw. One morning all able-bodied men were summoned to the "mairie." They were taken in herds to Laon, and shut up in the citadel; for two nights they slept on the floor and had to eat a nameless stew. On the third day of their absence, towards evening, a joyful rumour spread in the village. "The men are coming back! the men are coming back!" Women and children rushed out to meet husbands, sons, and fathers, and the noisy troop came back home, and stayed there.