An American outfit is never so weary that it doesn’t furnish a few inquisitive souls. Already curiosity was driving the doughboys out of the woods, by two’s and three’s, to see what was around. Just over a knoll they found a little fragment of history. A German machine gun, cunningly camouflaged; across it the body of a big “Feldwebel,” or German top sergeant, with a bayonet wound through his body; a couple of yards away a dead Marine, riddled with machine gun bullets, still grasping his rifle with the bloody bayonet fixed. At 9 A. M. the outfit was rounded up, and we were off again. As we plugged along the road in column of squads we thought with some disgust of the night marches we had made a hundred kilos behind the lines. Fortunately this hike was short. In an hour we entered another and larger wood, the Bois d’Euvezin sure enough, this time. Here we found the rest of the brigade, and bivouacked in the woods just off the road. The woods were full of German dugouts, evacuated by the enemy only a day or so before. Most of these were preempted by various headquarters. We settled down to make the most of our rest. For a wonder the sun was out; and despite the mud under foot, we were soon fairly warm and dry--and oh, how hungry! It was well along in the afternoon before the water carts pulled in, though, and we got our hot slum and coffee. The Y. M. C. A. kicked through with a canteen, and after some trouble in keeping the men from mobbing the place, crackers, chocolate and tobacco were sold. That night our gas training blossomed forth again. The Boche dropped a couple of shells around and our over-anxious sentries promptly bawled “Gas!” The alarm would be taken up and spread through the brigade, and by the time things quieted down they were off again. We finally got some sleep by the primitive but effective expedient of promising to blow the head off the next guy that raised the cry. Next day a great bunch of orders were dumped on me to read--all about the new censorship regulations. After wading through these, the officers were summoned to go up on a reconnoitering party to look over the sector which we were to take over that night. We set out, and after a couple of hours’ stiff hiking arrived at a very elaborate system of dugouts, in the edge of a wood, the Bois St. Claude. Here was the Regt’l Hdq. of the 61st Infantry, 5th Division, which we were to relieve. About five hundred meters north lay the little village of Vieville-en-Haye. Descriptions of this charming hamlet are superfluous, as we all had plenty of opportunity to contemplate it thereafter. It was early afternoon, and the Boche was behaving rather well; only occasionally slamming an .88 into the village in a perfunctory sort of way. From the northeast, however, came an intermittent crackle of rifle and machine gun firing, where the outposts were snarling and chattering away at each other.