But we too have our quality, and I rather think it is to be found in the greater freedom which we are allowed. We were not so well trained, but freedom stepped into the place of custom, and gave the necessary attitude of mind--that unprejudiced, untrammelled attitude which is essential to the quick grasping of a fresh _métier_. That is where our method--or, if you prefer it, our lack of method--helped us, even as their training helped the French. And the French, with their extraordinary facility of vision, do, I think, understand that we have simply pushed our freedom to its logical and legitimate outcome, that we could not be expected, after being accustomed, for many years past, to be on terms of simple easy friendship with men as with our own sex, above all, after working side by side with them since this war began, we could not be expected to say that we could not work with them in France, though we could in England, or that perhaps this girl would, and that girl couldn't.... We naturally proceeded to act _en masse_ as we had acted individually, to do on a large scale what had been done on a small, to manipulate great bodies of women where before a few friends had worked together. In every large body of persons there are bound to be one or two individuals who fail to come up to the required standard, but that does not alter the principle that what can safely be done in small quantities can safely be done in large, provided the conditions are altered to scale. And that is what we are doing, and what our Government is helping us to do; that is what our Women's Army and our voluntary workers in France are--the expression, on a large scale, of what bands of women have been doing so successfully on a small scale since the beginning of the war--helping, and even replacing the men. And just as, with our peculiar training and mode of thought, it is possible for the average Englishwoman to eliminate sex as a factor in the scheme of things, so it is possible to eliminate it in greater masses. In other words, it is perfectly possible, to men and girls brought up with the English method of free friendly intercourse, to work side by side, to meet, to walk together, and to remain--merely friends. Whether that is a good thing or not is another point altogether, as it is whether it makes for charm in a woman.... Certainly no woman in this world competes with a Frenchwoman for charm. It is as recognised as an Englishwoman's complexion--and considerably more lasting! Probably it is only ourselves and the Americans among the races of the world who could have instituted such an experiment as that of our Women's Army, but there is among the nations one which is supreme in "flair," in sympathy, and a certain ability to comprehend intellectually what it might not understand emotionally, and that nation is France.