How we enjoyed, at least, our eyesight on that journey! The appeal to the eye was constant--the color and form of scenes unfamiliar offering views of compelling attraction and delight. Each unadorned car window and door became the frame of pictures not a Millet nor a Rembrandt could depict. The villages, their sturdy houses of gray stone and red tile roofs; their streets, transformed from "routes" to "rules," where country roads came to town; their shopping squares stirred to enterprise by signs of "Boulangerie," "Boucherie," "Cafe" and "Menier Chocolat." Towering over all, the never-failing church, its lofty, cross-surmounted tower, giving to the scene tone and character. Rolling fields, aglow with harvest gold of wheat, oats and rye; orchards, teeming with luscious fruit ready to be gathered; rivers, threading their silvery way through meadow and wood; splendid roads, binding the beauteous bouquet of landscape with ribbons of silky white. The outstanding feature of that three-day journey was the apparent utter lack of enthusiasm on the part of a supposedly demonstrative people. Waiting at crossroads or railway stations, they would look at us in that same quiet, observing manner we had noticed at Brest. We passed through Morlix, home city of Foch; Versailles, and Sennes; and at no place did we hear so much as a single cheer. There were no welfare workers at any point, and if "Cafes" were numerous, we always paid well for our wine, bread and "cafe au lait." Coming from our own beloved America, where welfare workers greeted and feted us at every station, this apparent lack of hospitality more noticeable was difficult to understand. Possibly their impoverished condition forbade the refreshment part; but cheers and vives are possible, even to the poorest! Tuesday morning, August 19th, found us paralleling the picturesque river Yonne, which waters the vine-clad valleys of Burgundy. The sound of big gun firing had reached us in the early dawn, and we were all a-thrill at the thought of mighty things impending. Vaguely the words "Toul," "St. Mihiel," "Verdun," and "Metz," had filtered back from the flaming front; and, like hounds tugging at the leash, we were eager for the fray. At high noon we reached the quaint old town of Ancey-le-Franc, Department of Yonne. Here we left the train and drew up in formation along the roads and back through the lanes and fields. On the platform of the "gare" our gallant Division Commander, Brigadier General Baarth, attended by his staff, who had come on ahead of us by way of Paris, greeted us warmly and reviewed the troops. We were the first American soldiers to enter this area, and the village folks of Ancey-le-Franc, Shacenyelles, Fontenoy, and Nuites sur Yonne, welcomed us to their humble homes, barns and fields where we were to be billeted, with simple and cordial hospitality. CHAPTER V IN BILLETS--DEPARTURE FOR FRONT