As one approaches the front there are signs and directions innumerable—the arrows and flags showing the way to casualty clearing stations, signposts of all kinds showing the way to dumps, divisional baths, watering places for horses, canteens, headquarters, field cashiers, the local cinema show, or the Y.M.C.A. hut. It is in the villages where the troops nearest the line are billeted that the greatest variety of amusing inscriptions is to be found. At a badly strafed cross roads in a certain village there is a small round shell hole, not unlike a booking office, in the wall of a house. Above it are the words: BLIGHTY CORNER—BOOK HERE! It was in the same village that the Xth Siege Battery had the whole side of their mess knocked out—you could drive a gun team through the hole where the door had been. On a bit of remaining wall are the words: DON’T STAND OUT THERE KNOCKING—COME RIGHT IN! The streets are often labelled with names which at once give evidence as to the present or late occupants of the billets in them—Piccadilly, Prince’s Street, Black Watch Street, Quebec Street, Springbok Laager. The French names have, however, often been retained, and everywhere, for the benefit of the civilian population, one sees the warning—TAISEZ VOUS, MÉFIEZ VOUS—LES OREILLES ENNEMIES VOUS ÉCOUTENT. In more than one French office this notice is decorated with amusing pictures of Huns with huge ears listening from round corners. In one place it has been possible to devise a bi-lingual notice— to the DANGER pay ATTENTION TRAINS. aux A ‘poilu,’ who had come back to his village near the firing line on ‘permission’ and who wished to indulge in a little quiet gardening in the diminutive plot behind his cottage, was confronted with a large notice—DANGER—BLIND SHELL. His wife had to explain to him that a German 8-inch ‘dud’ had buried itself there. Being one whose duties lie on the lines of communication, he had not acquired that contempt for the unexploded shell which the ‘Bairnsfather’ Tommy has and so the garden was left severely alone! The position of this good French soldier is worthy of remark. He was a farrier at some way back supply depot and, in his whole life, had not heard a shot fired in anger. It was only when he came home on leave that he experienced the thrills of being under shell fire, and it was from his women folk that he had to learn the precise moment when he could decently retire to the cellar without an undue display of timidity! Ye Gods! What a leave! We may well be thankful if we get nothing more alarming than a Zeppelin raid when doing our week in town! The French villagers who sell groceries, eggs, wine, or ‘Anglish Beere’ in the many half-ruined shops in the shelled area advertise their goods often with notices in the weirdest of Anglo-French spelling, and it is extraordinary in what surroundings some of them manage to carry on business.