"It was an April night last spring. All day the wind and fog and rain had been coming in from the North Sea. The chill and damp went into the very marrow of the bones. When night fell a few of us officers crept down the long stair into a shell-proof room. There we had our pipes and gossiped about the events of the day and talked with the French captain, our guest, who was spending a week studying our sector. Finally the time came when we must go back into the trench to take our turn in the rain. "We were putting on our raincoats, when in my happiness I said, 'Well, men, you should congratulate me. One week from to-night I shall not be here in this rain and mud. I shall be home in England and have my little wife and my baby girl. Just one week! It seems like seven eternities instead of seven days and nights!' "I little dreamed the little tragedy that I had precipitated. My colonel was very kind. He told me that he would have his permission in three more months. The rest of the boys also said nice things. Suddenly we realized that the French captain was acting very strangely and saying excited things with his back towards us. We did not know how we had insulted him, nor could we understand what had happened. Finally my colonel said to him: "'Captain, I hope you will have your vacation soon and have a chance to go home and see your family.' "He turned on us like a crazy man. He put his fists in the air, he half shouted and half sobbed at us. "'How do you men dare talk to me about going home? Your land has never been invaded, nor your families ruined. Home! How can I go home? The Germans have had my town for a year. In their retreat they carried away my little girl and my young wife, and now the priest has gotten word to me that in six weeks my little girl and my young wife will both have babes by the German beast who carried them off.' "And then the Frenchman cursed God and cursed the devil! Cursed the Kaiser and cursed the Fatherland. Oh, it was so terrible. Doctor, I often wonder how Americans could have left the women and girls of Belgium and France in hell for two and a half years, while you men stood in safety and in peace." The historian will find it hard to answer that question. History will have it to say that England was the good Samaritan who helped the Belgians who had fallen among thieves, while Americans were among those who passed by on the other side. 7. "This War Will End Within Forty Years"