Ambulances, again. Those going forward are empty and trim: those returning are travel-stained and crowded. It is rumoured that the American Army has suffered over a hundred thousand casualties during the past few weeks. The fighting in the Argonne Forest has been terrific. Grandpré, through which we expect to pass, has been taken and lost half a dozen times. Each of the ambulances carries a full complement of stretcher-cases; and usually beside the driver sits a gaunt, miry statue with his arm in a sling, or a blood-soaked rag about his head. Occasionally, too, there occurs a civilian farm-wagon, containing a dozen or so less serious cases, with tickets tied to their buttons, on their way to an Evacuation Station. There are also women and children passengers; for the battle zone is extending daily, and it is needful, from sheer humanity, to remove the civil population to safer ground. On the box-seat of one of these wagons sits a small French boy. Perhaps he is eight years old. He is easily the proudest and happiest person in all this dolorous procession, for his right wrist is swathed in a slightly encrimsoned bandage, gloriously conspicuous. Then there are motor wagons, also full. Those going up contain ammunition, barbed wire, galvanized iron sheeting, engineering material, or rations. Those returning are heaped with salvage of every kind—furniture, the property of the refugees; battlefield _dèbris_, and, wherever an available chink presents itself, men—footsore men, stragglers, or regular working-parties. The latter are usually coloured, and, with steel helmets balanced at every angle upon their woolly pates, smile upon the seething activity beneath them with the simple enjoyment of a child at its first circus. These wagons—or camions—are of two types. There are big Thorneycroft lorries, holding three tons and made in England, and smaller vehicles of American design, known as “Quads.” These possess the unusual feature of a drive upon either axle; so that if your rear wheels slip backwards into a ditch or quagmire, your front wheels will continue to function and will extricate you in no time. Heaven knows how these contraptions are steered, but steered they are, and with remarkable skill. Then there are guns—and more guns. These are mainly French seventy-fives and hundred-and-fifty-fives, with American gun teams. Those going up are workmanlike, but inconspicuous. They are newly painted with the usual red, green, and yellow splashes. The fishing-nets which will be spread above them when they get into action, intersticed with grass, leaves, and twigs, are at present neatly furled and lashed along the barrels. The gunners sprawl anywhere but upon their hard little iron seats. The guns coming out look different. All are plastered with mud; some are on the casualty list, and are being towed upon trolleys by fussy little traction engines.