"It's the band off the cigar Pershing smoked at the dinner," explained one of the correspondents. Henriette put the treasure back in her locket and sighed. "Je suis très contente," she said. CHAPTER IX LETTERS HOME The British army tells a story of a soldier who had been at the front for a year and a half without ever once writing home. This state of affairs was called to the attention of his officer who summoned the soldier and asked him if he had no relatives. The Tommy admitted that he had a mother and an aunt. "I want you to go back to quarters," said the captain, "and stay there until you've written a letter. Then bring it to me." The soldier was gone for two hours and then he returned and handed the officer a single sheet of letter paper. His note read, "Dear Ma--This war is a blighter. Tell auntie. With love--Alfred." It was different in the American army. The doughboys wrote to their families to the second and third cousin. One soldier turned fifty-two letters over to his lieutenant for censorship in a single day. The men hardly seemed to need the suggestion posted on the wall of every Y.M.C.A. hut: "Remember to write to mother today." Of course it was not always mother. I came upon a couple of lieutenants one afternoon hard at work on an enormous batch of letters. It was originally intended that the chaplain should censor all the mail for the regiment but it was found that the task would be far beyond the powers of any one man. In time the job came to absorb a large part of the energy of the junior officers. "This," said one of the officers, "is the fifth soldier who's written that 'our officers are brave, intelligent and kind!' I know I'm brave and intelligent, but I'm not so damned kind," and he ripped out half a page of over faithful description of the country. "The man I have here," said the second officer, "has got a joke. He says, 'If I ever get home the Statue of Liberty will have to turn round if she ever wants to see me again.' It was all right the first time, but now I've got to his tenth letter and he's still using it." It has been found that more than fifty per cent. of the mail sent home consists of love letters. The fact that they have to be censored does not cramp the style of the writers in the least. One letter was so ardent as to arouse admiration. "This man writes the best love letter I ever read," said a lieutenant, looking up. "The only trouble is that he's writing to five girls at once and he uses the same model every time. Two of the girls live in the same town at that."